The Intellectual and the War Party in Masonry

Eckert shows that at present all secret societies are divided into two parties—the party of direction and the party of action or war party. The duty of the intellectual party is to plot and to contrive; that of the party of action, is to combine, recruit, excite to insurrection, and fight. The members of the war party are always members of the intellectual party, but not vice versa. The war party thus know what is being plotted. But the other party, concealed as common Freemasons amongst the simpletons of the lodges, cover both sections from danger.

If the war party succeed, the peace party go forward and seize upon the offices of state and the reins of power. Their men go to the hustings, make speeches that suit, are written up in the press, which, all the world over, is under Masonic influence. They are cried up by the adroit managers of mobs. They become the deputies, the ministers, the Talleyrands, the Fouches, the Gambettas, the Ferrys; and of course they make the war party generals, admirals, and officers of the army, the navy, and the police.

If the war party fails, the intellectual party, who close their lodges during the combat, appear afterwards as partisans, if possible, of the conquering party, or if they cannot be that, they silently conspire. They manage to get some friends into power. They agitate. They, in either case, come to the assistance of the defeated war party. They extenuate the faults, while condemning the heedless rashness of ill-advised, good-natured, though too ardent, young men. They cry for mercy. They move the popular compassion. In time, they free the culprits, and thus prepare for new commotions.

All Freemasonry has been long thus adapted, to enable the intellectual party to assist the war party in distress. It must be remembered that every Carbonaro is in reality a Freemason. He is taught the passes and can manipulate the members of the craft. Now, at the very threshold of the admission of a member to Freemasonry, the Master of the Lodge, the "Venerable", thus solemnly addresses him:—

"Masons," says he, "are obliged to assist each other by every means, when occasion offers. Freemasons ought not to mix themselves up in conspiracies; but if you come to know that a Freemason is engaged in any enterprise of the kind, and has fallen a victim to his imprudence, you ought to have compassion upon his misfortune, and the Masonic bond makes it a duty for you, to use all your influence and the influence of your friends, in order to diminish the rigor of punishment in his favor."

From this it will be seen, with what astute care Masonry prepares its dupes from the very beginning, to subserve the purposes of the universal Revolution. Under plea of compassion for a brother in distress, albeit through his supposed imprudence, the Mason's duty is to make use not only of all his own influence, but also "of the influence of his friends," to either deliver him altogether from the consequences of what is called "his misfortune," or "to diminish the rigour of his punishment.

Masonry, even in its most innocent form, is a criminal association. It is criminal in its oaths, which are at best rash; and it is criminal in promising obedience to unknown commands coming from hidden superiors. It always, therefore, sympathises with crime. It hates punishment of any repressive kind, and does what it can to destroy the death penalty even for murder. In revolution, its common practice is to open gaols, and let felons free upon society. When it cannot do this, it raises on their behalf a mock sympathy. Hence we have Victor Hugo pleading with every Government in Europe in favor of revolutionists; we have the French Republic liberating the Communists; and there is a motion before the French Parliament to repeal the laws against the party of dynamite—the Internationalists, whose aim is the destruction of every species of religion, law, order and property, and the establishment of absolute Socialism.

With ourselves, there is not a revolutionary movement created, that we do not find at the same time an intellectual party apparently disconnected with it, often found condemning it but in reality supporting it indirectly but zealously. The Odgers and others of the Trades Union, for instance, will murder and burn; but it is the Bradlaughs and men theorising in Parliament if they can, or on the platform if they cannot, who sustain that very party of action. They secretly sustain what in public they strongly reprobate, and if necessary disown and denounce. This is a point worthy of deep consideration, and shows more than anything else, the ability and astuteness with which the whole organization has been planned.

Again, we must remember, that while the heads of the party of action are well aware of the course being taken by the intellectual party, it does not follow that the intellectual party know the movements of the party of action, or even the individuals, at least so far as the rank and file are concerned. It therefore can happen in this country, that Freemasons or others who are in communication only with the Supreme Council on the Continent, get instructions to pursue one line of conduct, and that the war party for deep reasons get instructions to oppose them. This serves, while preventing the possibility of exposure, to enable the work of the Infidel Propaganda to be better done.

It is the deeply hidden Chief and his Council that concoct and direct all. They wield a power with which, as is well known, the diplomacy of every nation in the world must count. There are men either of this Council, or in the first line of its service, whom it will never permit to be molested. Weishaupt, Nubius, Mazzini, Piccolo Tigre, De Witt, Misley, Garibaldi, Number One, Hartmann, may have been arrested, banished, etc., but they never found the prison that could contain them long, nor the country that would dare deliver them up for crime against law or even life. It is determined by the Supreme Directory that at any cost, the men of their first lines shall not suffer; and from the beginning they have found means to enforce that determination against all the crowned heads of Europe. Now the man who succeeded to the Chieftaincy of this formidable conspiracy when Nubius passed away was none other than Lord Palmerston.

[Footnote: M. Eckert (opus cit.), was a Saxon lawyer of immense erudition, who devoted his life to unravel the mysteries of secret societies, and who published several documents of great value upon their action. He has been of opinion that "the interior order" not only now but always existed and governed the exterior mass of Masonry, and its cognate and subject secret societies. He says:—

"Masonry being a universal association is governed by one only chief called a Patriarch. The title of Grand Master of the Order is not the exclusive privilege of a family or of a nation. Scotland, England, France, and Germany have in their time had the honor to give the order its supreme chief. It appears that Lord Palmerston is clothed to-day (Eckert wrote in Lord Palmerston's time) with the dignity of Patriarch.

"At the side of the Patriarch are found two committees, the one legislative and the other executive. These committees, composed of delegates of the Grand Orients (mother national lodges), alone know the Patriarch, and are alone in relation with him.

"All the revolutions of modern times prove that the order is divided into two distinct parties—the one pacific, the other warlike.

"The first employs only intellectual means—that is to say, speech and writing.

"It brings the authorities or the persons whose destruction it has resolved upon to succumb or to mutual destruction.

"It seeks for the profit of the order all the places in the State, in the Church (Protestant), and in the Universities; in one word, all the positions of influence.

"It seduces the masses and dominates over public opinion by means of the press and of associations.

"Its Directory bears the name of the Grand Orient and it closes its lodges (I will say why presently) the moment the warlike division causes the masses which they have won over to secret societies to descend into the street.

"At the moment when the pacific division has pushed its works sufficiently far that a violent attack has chances of success, then, at a time not far distant, when mens' passions are inflamed; when authority is sufficiently weakened; or when the important posts are occupied by traitors, the warlike division will receive orders to employ all its activity.

"The Directory of the belligerent division is called the Firmament.

"From the moment they come to armed attacks, and that the belligerent division has taken the reins, the lodges of the pacific division are closed. These tactics again denote all the ruses of the order.

"In effect, they thus prevent the order being accused of co-operating in the revolt.

"Moreover, the members of the belligerent division, as high dignitaries, form part of the pacific division, but not reciprocally, as the existence of that division is unknown to the great part of the members of the other division—the first can fall back on the second in case of want of success. The brethren of the pacific division are eager to protect by all the means in their power the brethren of the belligerent division, representing them as patriots too ardent, who have permitted themselves to be carried away by the current in defiance of the prescriptions of the order and prudence."]