NOTES MADE DURING A SERIES OF MASONIC RESEARCHES, IN 18158, IN ASIA MINOR, SYRIA, PALESTINE, EGYPT AND EUROPE, AND THE RESULTS OF MUCH CORRESPONDENCE WITH FREEMASONS IN THOSE COUNTRIES. BY ROBERT MORRIS, LL.D., MASONIC WRITER AND LECTURER. "Thus saith the Lord, Stand ye in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths* where it's • Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to set forth a declaration of those things NEW YORK: BY THE MASONIC PUBLISHING COMPANY, 626 BROADWAY. according to act of Congress, in the year 1872, by ROBERT MORRIS, LL.D., Id tbe Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 10 HIS EXCELLENCY MOHAMMED EASCHID, PASHA-OENERAL OF SYRIA. In my first interview with the zealous band of Freemasons, lovingly at labor in their foyer mafonnique at Smyrna, it was reported to me that the Governor-General of Syria and Palestine, the brave, wise, and learned Mohammed Raschid, is one who delights to wear the Masonic apron, having shared joyfully in the mystic confidences of their fraternal group. And the brethren at Smyrna rejoiced to speak of the intelligence, urbanity, and Masonic skill of their renowned brother at Damascus, and favored me with letters of credence and introduction. Early upon my arrival in Damascus, therefore, I hastened to pay my respects to your Excellency, and to present you the greetings of a half-million American Masons, who are working (in more than six thousand lodges) the same principles of Divine truth, justice, and fraternity in which you, yourself, were inducted in your Masonic initiation at Smyrna. At the same time I laid before your Excellency the peculiar mission upon which I had embarked, and solicited your valued approval and patronage. I have now to acknowledge the very hearty manner in which your Excellency responded to my request; you afforded me the wisest counsel, and extended to me such aid as none can give so effectually as yourself. Finally, when the plan of the present volume was matured, and I solicited, by letter, the honor of dedicating it to him to whom I am so much indebted, your Excellency granted me the favor, with an urbanity which is in keeping with all I had previously known and enjoyed of your character. 4 DEDICATION. Since my return home, I have spoken in more than six hundred lodges, and reported to them the results of my Oriental study and labor. Everywhere I have made grateful mention of our distinguished Brother, the Vali of Syria; of his bravery in war, his wisdom in council, the respect and love of his people, and particularly his kindness to the American brother who had journeyed so far in pursuit of Masonic light. Should you, at any period, honor our country with a visit, your Excellency will find that this story of your kindness to the strange brother has come here before you; that the lineaments of your countenance are well known to us, and that a welcome awaits you, such as but few visitors have ever received from the Masonic fraternity. Would that your Excellency might so favor us! Would that the mother-land of Freemasonry might send such a representative to this great asylum of freedom, where the principles of the ancient Order have unrestricted sway, and every man feels that in his birth he is the equal of every other! May it please your Excellency: Our earthly lot differs most widely. Your name is spread afar as one to whom God has entrusted the government of a people. Our forms of faith are diverse. In language, customs, and modes of thought, we are cast in different moulds; but in Masonic Unity we are one, and one in Masonic Faith. As our hopes, and aims, and labors are one, we, trusting in one God, and doing, each of us, what we believe to be His expressed will, do humbly expect a common reward when we have passed that common lot which none can escape. To the Divine power, therefore, I tenderly commend your Excellency, both for this world and for that which is to come. TO H. E. MOHAMMED RASCHID This book, Freemasonry in the Holy Land, is, by permission, most respectfully and most fraternally DEDICATED. PREFACE. I Offer this book to the Masonic public, in redemption of my pledges to the generous friends who furnished me the means both for my expedition of 1868, and for publishing the book itself. That I have been more than three years getting it up, speaks, I think, for the thorough manner of its preparation. Agreeably to original promise, "the book is adapted to the plainest reader; one that the owner will take home and read in his domestic circle, and afterwards lend to his neighbors to read; equally a referencebook to the student, and a hand-book to the traveller; large enough to embrace so great a subject, yet no effort has been spared to compress ; the information. The Common Gavel has been used remorselessly in striking off excrescences. Written in the spirit of the Holy Writings, French and German infidelity has not made sufficient inroads into American Masonry, that less than nineteen-twentieths will welcome additional light upon the Divine authenticity of the Bible, and such light I have attempted freely to diffuse through this volume. Let every subscriber, after reading the book, bear me testimony that I have kept the faith with him. I have avoided the mysterious and romantic style so common amongst writers upon Palestine, and have cultivated the colloquial. One would think, to read standard accounts of the trees and' birds in the Holy Land, that they are different from birds and trees in |