Foundry

“ These skilled men worked together like tireless oxen under the unflinching eyes of the sweating, dirt-streaked Foundryman, the traditional Task Master of their Trade, and could readily produce any sort of cleverly carved and molded artifact, and an endless variety of molten and engraved idols and gods of all sizes, shapes, and descriptions. ”

“ But to them that follow after, the children that reap of the little founder's sowing, to them that have builded his England, have honoured his founding, have given her life and her greatness, have spoken with the lips of her learning, in the words of her wisdom, have sprung from her schools and her colleges, to them the little founder has been a symbol of all good things, he cast the bread upon the waters & they have found it after many days. ”

“ The art of the founder is fundamental in its nature. The arts of founding and forging are, indeed, the essential preliminary steps which lead to the finer manipulations entering into all metal constructions. Whether forging preceded founding or founding forging is immaterial; both arts are as old as recorded history—much older indeed. Moulding, which is the first step in the founder’s art, should be among the oldest of human discoveries, since man had only to take in his hand a lump of moist clay to receive ocular evidence of his power to give it any desired form. ”

“ Having taken the one downward step, the founder would be called upon constantly to repeat it, his moulds would remain set, some to the right, some to the wrong standard, and every type he cast would make it more impossible for him or his posterity to recover the simple standard from which he had erred. ”

“ The rich of one generation might, in the next, seek for a house there, either in their own persons or in those of their representatives. Perhaps the son and heir of the founder might have no better refuge. There should be occasional sunshine let into the story ”

“ As descendants, in whole or in part, from that illustrious people who, after conquering nature by their industry and perseverance, achieved liberty by their determined valour, and learning and science by their intellectual vigour, I rejoice to see you instituting bonds of union, for the purpose of preserving the remembrance of such an honourable lineage, and the ties of a common origin. ”

“ And perhaps no Founder ever had the good fortune to have his designs succeed more to his wish; this society has constantly produced one set of men after another, who have done both credit and service to their country by their practice and their writings. ”

“ In almost every generation, nevertheless, there happened to be some one descendant of the family gifted with a portion of the hard, keen sense, and practical energy, that had so remarkably distinguished the original founder. ”

“ Hence, we at once see the fitness of the symbolism which commences the aspirant's upward progress in the cultivation of knowledge and the search after truth, by recalling to his mind the condition of civilization and the social union of mankind, as necessary preparations for the attainment of these objects. In the allusions to the officers of a Lodge, and the degrees of Masonry as explanatory of the organization of our own society, we clothe in our symbolic language the history of the organization of society. ”

“ We bear the impress, at this hour, of the great thoughts and high aspirations, the struggles, and even the crimes, of our ancestral ages; and yet they have no greater resemblance to the present, except in the unchangeable characteristics of human nature itself, than the remotest forefathers in a long line of ancestry, whose likenesses hang in the galleries of our hereditary nobles, bear to the existing owner of title and estate. ”

“ Will you not make the beginning and lay the foundation in an inquiry whether the determination is sound or not sound, and so then build on it firmness and security? But if you lay a rotten and ruinous foundation, will not your miserable little building fall down the sooner, the more and the stronger are the materials which you shall lay on it? ”

“ We know, further—so far at least as we have yet succeeded in deciphering the record,—that the several dynasties were introduced, not in their lower, but in their higher forms;—that, in short, in the imposing programme of creation it was arranged, as a general rule, that in each of the great divisions of the procession the magnates should walk first. ”

“ May all the proper work of our institution that may be done in this house be such as thy wisdom may approve and thy goodness prosper. And finally, graciously be pleased, O thou Sovereign Architect of the Universe, to bless the craft wheresoever dispersed, and make them true and faithful to thee, to then neighbor, and to themselves. ”

“ The assumption that the wills of Founders were for ever inviolable, in spite of the lapse of ages and the total change of circumstances, had led, as it must always lead, to a perpetuity of perversion and to the defeat of the main object of the Founders themselves. ”

“ The grand structure, a monument alike of the marvelous progress of science and art, of constructive genius, and of business enterprise, was recognized by all as a credit to the generation, and the impulse was spontaneous and universal to join in the tributes of honor to the founders and promoters of the enterprise, living and dead, on the occasion of the completion of the work. ”

“ When some philosopher dreamed of founding plantations in the king's name and to the glory of God, England, and himself, then would the greedy merchants slay or cripple the philosopher's dream in the very palace of the king. ”

“ You've got to do a lot of clear, steady, merciless thinking—now, to-night. You've got to persuade yourself somehow that, Foundlings or no Foundlings, this regeneration of mankind business may still be set going—and by you. ”

“ Generally speaking, these establishments do not for any length of time carry out the intentions of their founders, and it sometimes happens that they become diametrically opposed to them. It is as much as one can do to trace after many long years a few vestiges of their founders' original intention. ”

“ The Roman family, gens, or house and tribe, the German benefice, commendation, and guild, the Anglo-Saxon ceorl and eorl castes, with their tithings and hundreds—all these institutions, mingling in the stream of history, made each individual into a part of something other than himself. ”

“ Royal houses resemble those Indian fig-trees, each branch of which, bending over to the earth, takes root and becomes a fig-tree itself. Each branch may become a dynasty. On the sole condition that it shall bend down to the people. ”

“ Both systems were in their origin essentially ethical reforms born of the generous ardour, the lofty aspirations, the tender compassion of their noble Founders, two of those beautiful spirits who appear at rare intervals on earth like beings come from a better world to support and guide our weak and erring nature. ”

“ And we, building upon the same foundation, with an added story to our edifice, modify, to suit legislation and a higher public sentiment and a broader conception of justice, both the foundation and the roof whenever a new principle is born or some great soul floods the world with light. ”

“ In tracing out a family, we incline to begin at the founder, and to descend gradually to his latest posterity. On the contrary, musing on a lofty oak, we begin at the trunk, and mount from it to the branches. As to historical facts, we love to proceed in the order of time ”

“ And then he proposed that a commencement should be made with a body of fifty ** founders," to be the mustard-seed of future growth ; ^*if only fifty men, good and true, can be found to join as founders, the thing can be established, and the further development will be comparatively easy." ”

“ Less complete because it does not cover the individual altogether in all the acts of life is the creation of secret associations, professional unions, learned societies, etc. The founder conceives an ideal of complete living or one limited to a given end, and puts it into practice, having for material men grouped of their free choice, or by coöptation. ”

“ The Inventors, sensible of the great utility of their Discovery, have mentioned it to several of the Trade, who have made very considerable offers to encourage the laying open the Secret: But as their desire is, that every Printer in the Kingdom might be benefited by it they propose to make the Discovery as universal as possible, by making an honourable and generous present of it to the whole trade: To many of whom they are under some Obligations for the kind encouragement of their new Foundery. ”

“ Go back as far as you please, and you will find that the pioneer founders of all the abiding benefits of American civilization, were satisfied with a very modest amount of this world's goods and gear, as compared with their descendants of the third generation. ”

“ They perhaps claim some knight or nobleman as the founder of the race, although he may have really done nothing for the practical advantage of the family; the true founders being merely proprietors of land, dignified as J.P.'s, and sometimes sheriffs, throwing off branches into the clerical and legal professions. ”

“ Should it be faithfully carried into effect with an earnestness and sagacity of application and a steady perseverance of purpose proportioned to the means furnished by the will of the founder, and to the greatness and simplicity of his design as by himself declared,—'the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men,'—it is no extravagance of anticipation to declare that his name will hereafter be enrolled among the benefactors of mankind. ”

“ You have finished nothing here; you have been only clearing away rubbish and preparing the foundations; and notwithstanding that you have been under the eyes of the best masters, and have laid your foundations of the best materials and in the most scholarly manner, yet like the foundations for any other superstructure, unless built upon they will soon grow weak and be frittered away. ”

“ The provision, then, which we have here made is no other than Human Nature. Nor do I fear that my sensible reader, though most luxurious in his taste, will start, cavil, or be offended, because I have named but one article. ”

“ It remains to consider the growth of property in the several ethnical periods, the rules that sprang up with respect to its ownership and inheritance, and the influence which it exerted upon ancient society. ”

“ In a few years men will understand why, in this country, as well as in England, people are hunting up their genealogy, and by tradition, history, and heraldry, trying to ascertain of what family they are. ”

“ As we ascend in the order of time and of development, but descend in the scale of human advancement, inventions become more simple, and more direct in their relations to primary wants; and institutions approach nearer and nearer to the elementary form of a gens composed of consanguinei, under a chief of their own election, and to the tribe composed of kindred gentes, under the government of a council of chiefs. ”

“ This might be illustrated from the history of modern art, when some felicity of invention or achievement is explained by the fact that several strains of lineage, several branches of the Indo-European stock, have contributed to a result which no one of them could have produced alone. ”

“ One can scarcely study such a form, as he loosens fragment after fragment from a crumbling hillside, without a conviction that the law of lineal descent, with the holding power of heredity and the directing power of an all comprehensive plan, entered together into its creation. ”

“ These advantages are but for the purpose of laying the foundation; the building is the work of after years. And he who does not build, does not even preserve the foundation. Alas! how many well-laid foundations have moldered into ruin! ”

“ He rather favours the opinion of those who hold the fear and hate of the world which distinguished the early Christian ages, to have been founded on an erroneous comprehension of the doctrine and example of the great Founder, who, as far as we are able to learn, facilitated the creation of real art. ”

“ Within a clan, or gens, everyone was, or was supposed to be, descended from a common ancestor, and thus related to all the others—in the former the line of descent being traced through the female, and in the latter, through the male. ”

“ The result of recent research into the early organization of society, the growth of the governmental idea, and the development of the family, among tribes in the ascending scale, serve to throw new and unexpected light upon the customs, ideas, institutions, and legends of early historic peoples. ”

“ Thus it is change and development are seen everywhere in production. The chief privileges of the Founders have gone, although they still take some little part in the stamping of weights and measures; but that, too, has become a Government duty. ”

“ On that you would be able to build your position, but, if you have not got the foundation money, any edifice you may hope to build without that foundation would crumble down to pieces and you would find yourself in the open air without an edifice. ”

“ When of late I have cast my Eyes upon the Behaviour of some People, who shall be nameless, it has put me in Mind of the Free-Masons. These, you know, are divided in several Companies; each Company have a Lodge of their own; every Lodge has a Master ”

“ Perhaps you think that I ought to go and give you a diagram of it all here in my book, but I fancy that anyone who knows anything at all about the craft of founding will perfectly well understand by description. So that’s enough for furnaces. ”