Virtue Awareness

God is:

God is like a Coke. He's the real thing.

God is like a Bayer Aspirin. He works wonders.

God is like Hallmark Cards. He cared enough to send the very best.

God is like General Electric. He lights the path.

God is like Tide. He gets the stain out others leave behind.

God is like Hair Spray. He holds through all kind of weather.

God is like Dial Soap," aren't you glad you know him?

God is like Sears. He has everything.

God is like Alka Seltzer, try Him, you'll like Him.

God is like Scotch tape, you can't see Him but you know He's there.

Author Unknown

 

A Blueprint For Achievement

BELIEVE while others are doubting.

PLAN while other are playing.

STUDY while others are sleeping.

DECIDE while others are delaying.

PREPARE while others are daydreaming.

BEGIN while others are procrastinating.

WORK while others are wishing.

SAVE while others are wasting.

LISTEN while other are talking.

SMILE while others are pouting.

COMMEND while others are criticizing.

PERSIST while others are quitting.

Author: William Arthur Ward

THE CREED OF GOODNESS

To pass the time in doing good,

To count the evils we put down,

To have our deeds so understood,

Is Nobler than to wear a crown,

To bless the people as we go,

To scatter seeds that grow to life,

To strike all sins a deadly blow,

Is better than to stir up strife.

 

Just think how happy all would be,

If kindness was a usual deed,

Just think what that would mean to me,

If that was man's accepted creed:

The world would be more satisfied

If all people felt to love;

Good souls would not be crucified,

But all would look to God above.

 

Let every day that comes your way

Count for goodness fully done,

Let every act of every day

Shine out as brilliant as the sun,

Let others call you by your name

That represents a crown of joy,

For this of all, is greatest fame,

That none on earth can e'er destroy.

By Marcus Garvey

A Black Gift to Masonry

      Most theologians and many scientists, alike, agree that Negroes and Negroid peoples of the world are descendants of Ham, the second son of Noah (Gen.5:32), and refer to them as Hamitic peoples; and further, there are three main divisions in the Hamitic race and language, Egyptian, Ethiopia or Cushite, and Libyan or Berber. Here in these United States, we define a Negro as anyone who had a Negro ancestor- no matter how far back, or one who has Negro blood in his veins- no matter how small a trace. As a Mason, I'd like you to read the following: you can accept it or reject it as you choose. I cite for my authority that Great Light in Masonry, the Holy Bible, with chapter and verse. Masonry is colored or, to use the present day vernacular, a Black institution. Made of colored clay, formed by a Black brain and painted with the brush of  Black artists; for Solomon, King of Israel, the Wise; Hiram, King of Tyre, the Strong; and Hiram,     Widow's Son, the Beautiful; all that Negro blood in their veins, and had they lived in America today, they would be called  Negroes. The Jewish people, from which Solomon came were much mixed with black race. This intermingling dates as far back as Abraham, for Abraham's son Ishmael, was born of Hagar, an Egyptian woman(Gen.21:21). The Egyptians came from Mizriam (Gen. 10:6) the second son of Ham, who was the father of the Black race. Joseph (Gen. 41:45) son of Jacob and Rachel, the great and wise governor under Pharaoh, married an Egyptian, a Black woman (Asenath, daughter of Potipherah) who bore him two sons Ephraim and Manesseh, the fathers of two of the twelve tribes of Israel.   Moses, the lawgiver, married a Black woman, an Ethiopian, a daughter of Cush, the first son of Ham, by whom he had children. (Moses married Ziporah, daughter of Jethro.) Solomon, a man of the tribe of Judah, married Rahab, a Cannonitish woman, a descendant of Canaan, the fourth son of Ham. They had a son, Boaz, the ancestor of Jesse, David and Solomon (Ruth 4:17). ( Read 1 Chronicles, Chapters 1 thru 12.) To add to this, Solomon's mother, Bathsheba, was a Cannonitish woman (11 Sam, 12:24), Hiram, King of Tyre, was a Black man. Tyre was a city of Phoenicia, a dark race descendant of Ham, and therefore a part of the Hamitic race. Hiram, the Architect, was also a Black man. His mother, a Jewess, his father, a Tyrian, a man of the Hamitic race (1 Kings, Ch. 7:14). ( Song of Solomon, Ch. 1:5-6, " I am Black, but comely") Every Mason ought to be reminded that the altar on which he took his oath and obligation was given to the Masonic World by Black men- two Negro Kings and a Negro Architect.

 

The Ten Commandments Of  Masonry

I. God, thou shalt adore, revere, honor and love him by practicing his virtues.

II. Thy religion shall be, to do good because it is a pleasure to thee, and not merely because it is a duty.

III. Thou shalt unceasingly war against vice.

IV. Thou shalt honor thy parents.

V. Thou shalt cherish thy wife and children.

VI. Thy friend shall be to thee a second self.

VII. Thou shalt in everything refrain from excess.

VIII. Thou shalt allow no passions to become thy master.

IX. Thou shalt hear much. Thou shalt speak little. Thou shalt act well.

X. Thou shalt study to know man; that thereby thou mayest learn to know thyself.

Both the soul and God are present in the body, but there is the curtain of egoism between them and for this reason the soul cannot see God.

Both live in the same house, at the same time, but do not see each other.

 

WHEN IS A MAN A MASON ?                        

 (A Profound Question Indeed)

A Mason is mason when he can look over the hills, the rivers and the horizon with a profound sense of his own littleness in the vast scheme of things and yet have faith, hope and courage which is the root of every virtue. When he knows that down in his heart every man is as noble, as vile, as divine, and as lonely as himself, and seeks to know, to forgive and love his fellowman. When he knows how to sympathize with men in their sorrows, yes, even in their sins knowing that each man fights a hard fight against many odds. When he has learned how to make friends and keep them and above all how to keep friends with himself. When he can be happy and high minded amid meager drudgeries of life, when no voice of distress reaches his ears in vain, no hand seeks his aid without response. When he has kept the faith with his fellowman, and with his God, glad to live, but not afraid to die. Such a man has found the secret of masonry, and the one which is trying to give it to the world.

 

WHAT IS A MASON?

       A Mason is a Man and a Brother whose TRUST is in GOD. He meets you on the LEVEL and acts upon the SQUARE. Truth is his COMPASS and he is ever PLUMB. He has a true GRIP on all that is RITE. He is loyal to his ORDER  and whatever his DEGREE he is MASTER of himself. In the LODGE of Life he wears unstained White LAMBSKIN of Innocence From his INITIATION as an ENTERED APPRENTICE he travels ever EAST toward the LIGHT of WISDOM until he receives the final the DIVINE PASSWORD that admits him into the INEFFABLE PRESENCE OF THE ETERNAL SUPREME GRAND MASTER OF THE UNIVERSE

GOD

The Level and The Square (1854)
Dr. Robert Morris (1818-1888)
Past Grand Master (1858-1859) of the Grand Lodge of Kentucky, USA
Chartered Royal Solomon Mother Lodge #293 (1873, Israel's first regular)

We meet upon the Level and we part upon the Square.
What words of precious meaning, those words Masonic are!
Come, let us contemplate them! They are worthy of a thought;
In the very walls of Masonry the sentiment is wrought.

We meet upon the Level, though from every station come,
The rich man from his palace and the poor man from his home;
For the rich must leave his wealth and state outside the Mason's door,
And the poor man finds his best respect upon the Checkered Floor.

We act upon the Plumb - 'tis the orders of our Guide.
We walk upright in virtue's way and lean to neither side;
The All-Seeing Eye that reads our hearts doth bear us witness true
That we still try to honor God and give each man his due.

We part upon the Square, for the world must have its due;
We mingle with the multitude, a faithful band and true.
But the influence of our gatherings in memory is green,
And we long upon the Level to renew the happy scene.

There's a world where all are equal - we are hurrying toward it fast,
We shall meet upon the Level there when the gates of Death are past;
We shall stand before the Orient, and our Master will be there
To try the blocks we offer with His own unerring Square.

We shall meet upon the Level there, but never thence depart.
There's a Mansion - 'tis all ready for each trusting, faithful heart.
There's a Mansion, and a welcome, and a multitude is there
Who have met upon the Level and been tried upon the Square.

Let us meet upon the Level, then while laboring patient here;
Let us meet and let us labor, though the labor be severe;
Already in the Western sky the signs bid us prepare
To gather up our Working Tools and part upon the Square.

Hands round, ye faithful Brotherhood, the bright fraternal Chain.
We part upon the Square below to meet in Heaven again!
What words of precious meaning, those words Masonic are --
We meet upon the Level and we part upon the square.