THE SELF MADE MASON

It is hard to confuse our society today with that of 17th century Britain.  Students of history will often pick out 'evidence' and use it to tell us a story about a particular period or way of thinking. We pick it up to answer questions. Not everyone has those questions, not everyone shares a need. How then does a self-made man embrace the freedom of enlightened thinking? Let's separate out the ideal from the awkward. 'Once the passions and egotism could be excised, the ideal of fraternity could be refined.' (Living the Enlightenment, pg 154 Jacobs). That ideal is where for many of us, we find the earliest reliance on metaphors of friendship and family. When we do that, up pops the influence of the Earl of Shaftesbury, whose writings on the social nature of the truly civilized man were so popular in an18th century world. So my questions is about that state of mind. Is a man born with it, or can he acquire it? What does that state of mind say about us? There is a difference about a man who admires talent, one who is jealous and the man who is inspired. I think we are smothered not because we can't understand, but because we haven't established a dialogue, or a space where we can challenge interpretations of the Craft.  Of course the qualifier is the line I quoted earlier- 'Once the passions and eqotism could be excised...'   It's important because to arrive at enlightenment we require the freedom of inclination. That is another way of acknowledge chaos and madness. Freedom is not a cultivated garden. That may be the outcome but the start is what happens before order is imposed, before we agree to certain collaborations because we value the outcome. Masonry exists on the other side of that freedom.  Can that be taught? I don't think it can. But I do think Masonry is enticing. It draws us out, to challenge our own thinking, to expand, to become intellectually and philosophically fearless.