Brethren know by now that I am no believer in what may be termed the pre-sanctified origin of Masonry. I think that with 200 other similar convivial, secret and semi-secret societies, harmless and not-so-innocent, it sprang up among not very intelligent and not over-moral persons at a very uneasy time in British history: a time of violent and not very scrupulous politics, of not-long-past and not-quite-over civil war.
These societies were built round or tacked upon all sorts of fantastic rituals, legends and practices; Freemasonry upon operative masonry, then declining as a select and guarded skilled craft.
Title
1943 - Freemasonry As It Might Have Been and As It May Become - Bro C L Griffiths.
