[The Principles of Masonic Law by Albert G. Mackey]@TWC D-Link bookThe Principles of Masonic Law CHAPTER IV 13/21
The purpose having been effected, and the Mason having been made, he revokes his dispensation, and the lodge is dismissed.
If we assumed any other ground than this, we should be compelled to say, that though the Grand Master might authorise others to make Masons, when he was absent, as in the usual case of lodges under dispensation yet the instant that he attempted to convey the same powers to be exercised in his presence, and under his personal supervision, his authority would cease.
This course of reasoning would necessarily lead to a contradiction in terms, if not to an actual absurdity. It is proper to state, in conclusion, that the views here set forth are not entertained by the very able Committee of Foreign Correspondence of the Grand Lodge of Florida, who only admit the power of the Grand Master to make Masons in the Grand Lodge.
On the other hand, the Grand Lodge of Wisconsin, at its last communication, adopted a report, asserting "that the Grand Master has the right to make Masons at sight, in cases which he may deem proper"-- and the Committee of Correspondence of New York declares, that "since the time when the memory of man runneth not to the contrary, Grand Masters have enjoyed the privilege of making Masons at sight, without any preliminaries, and at any suitable time or place." The opinions of the two last quoted Grand Lodges embody the general sentiment of the Craft on this subject.[25] But although the prerogative is thus almost universally ceded to Grand Masters, there are many very reasonable doubts as to the expediency of its exercise, except under extraordinary circumstances of emergency. In England, the practice has generally been confined to the making of Princes of the Royal Family, who, for reasons of state, were unwilling to reduce themselves to the level of ordinary candidates and receive their initiation publicly in a subordinate lodge. But in the exercise of this prerogative, the Grand Master cannot dispense with any of the requisite forms of initiation, prescribed by the oral laws of the Order.
He cannot communicate the degrees, but must adhere to all the established ceremonies--the conferring of degrees by "communication" being a form unknown to the York rite.
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