Note 35 — THE CATHOLIC WORLD. VOL. XXII., No. 128.—NOVEMBER, 1875.

Those in this country who respect religion, law, and the peace of society should not be imposed upon by the aspect of Freemasonry here. The principles and modes of acting of the society are those we have described. The application of them depends wholly on time, place, and circumstances. The ordinary observer sees nothing in the members of the craft here but a number of inoffensive individuals, who belong to a soi-disant benevolent association which, by means of secret signs, enables them to get out of the clutches of the law, procure employment and office, and obtain other advantages not possessed by the rest of their fellow-citizens. But then the innocent rank and file are the dead weight which the society employs, on occasion, to aid in compassing its ulterior designs. Here there are no civil or religious institutions which stand in their way, and their mode of action is to sap and mine the morals of the community, on which society rests, and with which it must perish. Of what it is capable, if it seems needful to compassing its ends, any one may understand by the fiendish murder of William Morgan. This murder was decided on at a lodge-meeting directed by Freemason officials, in pursuance of the rules of the craft, and was perpetrated by Freemasons bearing a respectable character, who had never before been guilty of a criminal action, who were known, yet were never punished nor even tried, but died a natural death, and who do not appear to have experienced any loss of reputation for their foul deed. (See Mr. Thurlow Weed’s recent letter to the New York Herald.)