200 Years ago Freemasonry was formally and permanently settled in Pennsylvania; and now all over the state are herald expressions in communications of the event. All the various phases of progressive business life have their periodic checking up: and is it highly proper and commendable that the same system prevail in social life, so to night Warren Lodge No. 240 joins hands with all members of the craft in paying honors to the event, checking up the progress the Fraternity has made in the state during those 200 years.

And that this may be done intelligently and understandingly, it is well to take a casual glance at the conditions and standing of the Fraternity prior to and at the time of its institution here.

In all periods and ages of Mans existence he appears to have had an uncontrollable desire or ambition to build, seen in the Pyramids of Egypt. The ruins of Pompeii. and the great mass of ancient productions architectural.

Thornburgh, Says, " In all ages of the world, and especially since the building of King Solomon’s Temple, there has been skilled artisans distinguished from the ordinary workmen. Among the most noted of them were the workers in stone, called "Masons". The word "Mason" comes from the Latin "Maconetus" meaning "A Builder"

Skilled Operative Masons plied their trade in England, France, and Italy during the Middle Ages, and were framed for the character of the work. They were not only builders, but were architects as well.

They stamped their individuality on every building, they had so far advanced as skilled Masons as to be a privileged class, free to travel wherever they pleased, and to plan and erect buildings, exempt from taxes and limitations imposed on the loss skilled workers.

Being free as to territory and taxes and free as to the character of their work they were called "Free Masons"

In those days they traveled much from place to place in the work of the craft. Writing was not much practiced and certificates of character not known. So that to have confidence in each other, and to prove to the craft that he had been regularly taught the trade, had served the requisite apprentice-ship, a system of signs and passwords were adopted.

They naturally formed the custom of meeting in loges where Ritualistic methods were adopted. Operative Masonry was a religion and a trade.

In the years 926 of the Christian Era, the Operative Mason were granted a charter for a regular organization empowering them to meet annually at York, where the first Grand Lodge was organized, at which Edwin, the brother of King Athelstan, Presided as Grand Master.

Here the germ of Speculative or Symbolic Masonry was planted.

It has been described as, "a beautiful system of morality, veiled in allegory and illustrated by symbols," Its underlying principles being the "Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of Men"

This is the manner of its institutions: Early in the Eighteen Century the operative Mason began to admit into their Lodges gentlemen who were distinguished in the professions, and who the Operatives desired to honor.

They were "Accepted Masons." This accounts for the words "Free and Accepted." "Free" meant Free Operative Mason, and Accepted meant not an Operative, but one honored as having been accepted among the Operative as a distinction.

The custom of accepting selected gentlemen and admitting them to membership in the Operative Lodges become quite common. These accepted Masons were admitted to the degrees of Entered Apprentice and Fellow Craft, but not of that of Master.

In the year of 1710 the rev. James Anderson, D.D., a Scotch Presbyterian minister, who was an "Accepted Manson," was made Chaplain of as Operative Lodge in London. By this time many other men who were not Operative, were admitted into the Lodges. Among these "Accepted Masons" a spirit of dissatisfaction grew up because they realized that they were not admitted to all the degrees, and they chafed under this discrimination. They also concluded that Operative Masonry was too narrow in its teachings for men who were not actual Operatives, and they conceived the idea and undertook the work of broadening the teachings and elevating the morals of the Fraternity.

Their number grew until they were able, in 1717, to influence the majority of the members of the four lodges to unite in the organization of the Grand Lodge and to adopt a new system, which would abrogate the Operative requirements.

This movement, under the lead of Dr. Anderson, resulted in the organization of Speculative Freemasonry, or rather the transformation of the Operative into the Symbolic.

Speculative or Symbolic Freemasonry was fully launched by the organization of the Grand Lodge. Dr. Anderson was elected the first Grand secretary. To him was entrusted the work of modifying the ceremonies and regulations. He took the Operative Ritual and made such changes in it as would make it suitable for those who were Accepted and not Operatives Masons.

He gave the Operative tools and implements symbolic meaning, by which beautiful moral lessons are taught. The fact that is Operative Lodges only able-bodied men who were capable of doing Operative work were admitted accounts for the physical perfection required in the Speculative Masonry.

In the Operative system, the idea was for the Master to observe the sun rising and therefore were in the West, the idea was for the Junior Warden should face the sun at High Meridian, and therefore was placed in the North. The Senior Warden, to face the setting sun, and was placed in the East. Dr Anderson changed this to the system as now worked.

In the operative ritual the lodge was not opened in the first and the second and then in the third degrees, but was opened in the seventh degree, which is the Master’s degree. As He (Dr. Anderson) and the others who joined with him from the Operatives had only received the first and second degrees, they had to begin at the bottom and work up the new system, and as they had not received the Master’s degree, they had no form of the opening or ceremonies of that degree. Dr. Anderson not knowing the ceremony of the Operative Master’s degree, invented the legends of the Speculative third degree, in which he portrays the loss of the secrets of a Master Mason, by the death of Hiram Abif.

The legend of the third degree was doubtless taken by Dr. Anderson from the Ancient Egyptian Mysteries. Egypt, once the land of science and philosophy, and now the keeper of stately tombs and historical monuments, was the birthplace of many of the mysteries adopted by succeeding people.

As before stated in 1717, four Lodges in the south of England united and made up the Premier Grand Lodge. In 1775 the Lodges of York formed a Grand Lodge of their own, calling it the Grand Lodge of York. These two Grand Lodges worked together in unison until in 1735 the Grand Master of England constituted two Lodges within the jurisdiction of the grand Lodge of York, thereafter all intercourse between them coased.

In 1738 a lot of the brothers, being aggrieved of that they termed innovations of the landmarks, seceded from the Grand Lodge of England, and seeing the breach between the two Grand Lodges formed a third Grand Lodge in London in 1739 and took the name of Ancient York Masons, Claiming that they alone adhered to the ancient landmarks, and called the Grand Lodge of England "Modern."

These three Grand Lodges operated independently till 1813 when they were united under the name of the "United Grand Lodge of England."

There is little or no record evidence of the Fraternity in the very early of this Country

New Jersey claims the distinction of having the first permanent resident Mason, in the person of John Skene, who landed here in 1682, and settled at Burlington, N.J. Mass. Claims to have the first born American citizen to be made a Mason in this Country in the person of Jonathan Belcher, who went to N.J. and finally became Governor of the Province.

Yet prior to the establishing any regular Lodges here, no doubt that among the early emigrants were Masons who often convened together, and possibly did some Masonic work.

In 1730 Daniel Cox, armed with a deputation from the Grand Lodge of England, (the first authority ever given for the assembling of Free Masons in America in Lodges) and established in the city of Philadelphia, Pa., St. John’s lodge. In this Lodge Benjamin Franklin was made a Mason, and was Master of it in 1734.

In 1733, a second St. John’s Lodge was established in Boston, Mass.

In 1758, the Ancient York Lodge established a Lodge of Ancient Master Mason in Philadelphia.

As near as can be determined during the Revolutionary period the "Moderns" sided with the Britons and the "Ancients" with the Americans, but all loyal to their fraternal vows.

In 1780, inspired by the spirit of independence several of the Legends united and formed as independent Grand Lodge and unanimously chose Brother George Washington, Master. But it seems that it never functioned.

St. John’s Lodge No.1 of 1730 vacated long ago, and the present St. John’s Lodge No. 115 is a different body.

In 1755, the first Masonic Lodge house was dedicated in Philadelphia, by the Ancient York Masons, with impressive ceremonies.

In 1786, the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania, withdrew its allegiance to the Grand Lodge of England. This was the first Grand Lodge in America to take such action. The most important step ever taken by a Grand lodge.

It was a decisive declaration that it along had absolute Masonic Jurisdiction of the state and all territory thereunto belonging.

Up to 1843, all business of the Lodges in Pennsylvania was transacted in the first degree. At that time it was ordered that all business of the Lodge, and the opening and closing must be done in the Master’s degree.

In 1873, the new Masonic Temple at Philadelphia was dedicated. Writing in 1914, Thornburgh says of it, "The Masonic Temple at Philadelphia is the largest and finest Masonic building in the world devoted exclusively to Freemasonry. One of its halls, the Egyptian Hall, is said to be the finest specimen of Egyptian decoration outside of Egypt"

Nov. 4^th, 1752 Brother George Washington was initiated into the Masonic Fraternity by the Lodge in Fredericksburg, Virginia.

On the 150^th Anniversary of the event our Grand lodge put on a grand celebration at which the President of the United States, Brother Theodore Roosevelt was present and delivered and address on "Freemasonry and citizenship."

1824, (October 2^nd, in the afternoon) Brother General Lafayette, was the guest of the Grand Lodge at an extra communication, held in Philadelphia. In the address of welcome he was notified that he had been made a member of the Grand Lodge, In reply he said, "I think you for the honor you have just conferred on me, and assure you that I shall never forget this mark of your kind distinction by which I am made a member of a body of which Franklin was the father and Washington was the associate."

1831, (Dec. 26^th) occurred the death of Brother Stephen Girard, Who by his will bequeathed to the Grand Lodge $20,000 this legacy is now known as the "Stephen Girard Charity Fund" and now amounts to more that $100,000. The first large bequest to the Grand Lodge.

In the year 1706, occurred the birth of our most distinguished Brother, Benjamin Franklin, a former Grand Master of Masons.

1903, Mar. 4^th the Grand Lodge promulgated the idea of a Masonic Home.

1913, June 5^th the Grand Lodge Hall at Elizabethtown, Pa. Was dedicated. It was the greatest of the accompliments of the Grand Lodge; of it Past Grand Master, Brother J. Henry Williams, said, "The Crowning Glory of the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania.

In 1930, the membership of the Fraternity in Pennsylvania was 214,660.

In 1930 the number of guests in the Masonic Homes were 510.