High In Masonry.

        Give me a board so I can trace on
        How high I have gone as a mason,
        Said worker on true square cut stone
        Unto some knights of good St. John.

        Each one of them could trace with ease
        The highest Masonic degrees,
        Tell us how high then you have gone
        They said to worker on cut stone.

        Who said to their astonishment
        To top of Washington monument,
        I solemnly to you declare
        And will swear to fact upon the square.

        I there stood thirty-three degrees,
        While the mercury did freeze,
        And none of you will have desire
        In masonry for to go higher.

James McIntyre

James McIntyre was a Canadian poet, most notable for his poetry concerning cheese, cheese-making, dairying, and dairy products. Often referred to as 'The Cheese Poet,' McIntyre's work is celebrated for its earnestness and unintentional humor, making him both a beloved and an infamous figure in literary circles. He emigrated from Scotland to Canada in 1851 and settled in Ingersoll, Ontario, where he became a successful businessman and community leader.

James McIntyre

Prologue To South Ontario Sketches.

James McIntyre, Simple Poetry

Ensilage.

James McIntyre, Simple Poetry

Lines On Woodstock.

James McIntyre, Simple Poetry

Advice To A Little Girl.

James McIntyre, Simple Poetry

English

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The Master's Song.

Written for the freemasons of St. John's Lodge No. 1, New York.




Members of an order
    Ancient as the earth;
All within our border
    Realize its worth.
Genial is the greeting
    That awaits us there,
On the level meeting,
    Parting on the square.
Like the workmen olden,
    Who our craft designed,
We the precept golden
    Ever bear in mind.

Masons never falter,
    We each other know,
As around the altar
    Hand in hand we go;
Loud hosannas singing
    To our Source above,
And heart-offerings bringing
    To the God of Love.
Like the workmen olden,
    Who our craft designed,
We the precept golden
    Ever bear in mind.

There's a mystic beauty
    In our working plan,...

George Pope Morris

Adoniram. A Legend of the Temple.

    The dew was gone,
The morn was bright, the skies were fair,
The flowers smiled neath the sunbeams ray,
Tall cedars grew in beauty there.
As Adoniram took his way,
    To Lebanon.

    Praise his heart filled,
More than four hundred years had fled,
Since from stern Egypt marched the bands,
Whose sons, with Solomon at their head,
And Tyrian brethern's skilful hands,
    Prepare to build.

    He watched them there,
Round every block, and every stone,
Masonic implements were laid,
But around one were many thrown,
And yet it seemed already made,
    Tried, true and square.

    He wandering spake,
"Are not all from one mountain brought
As jewels for a diadem,
Why, have they at this one stone wrought,
Will not...

Harriet Annie Wilkins

The Modern Climber.

    Year after year, as Summer suns come round,
    Upon the Calais packet am I found:
    Thence to Geneva hurried by express,
    I halt for breakfast, bathe, and change my dress.
    My well-worn knapsack to my back I strap;
    My Alpine rope I neatly round me wrap;
    Then, axe in hand, the diligence disdaining,
    I walk to Chamonix, by way of training.
    Arrived at Coutlet's Inn by eventide,
    I interview my porter and my guide:
    My guide, that Mentor who has dragg'd full oft
    These aching, shaking, quaking limbs aloft;
    Braved falling stones, cut steps on ice-slopes steep,
    That I the glory of his deeds might reap.
    My porter, who with uncomplaining back
    O'er passes, peaks, and glaciers bears my pack:
    Tho' now...

Edward Woodley Bowling

The Palace

When I was a King and a Mason, a Master proven and skilled,
I cleared me ground for a Palace such as a King should build.
I decreed and dug down to my levels. Presently, under the silt,
I came on the wreck of a Palace such as a King had built.

There was no worth in the fashion, there was no wit in the plan,
Hither and thither, aimless, the ruined footings ran,
Masonry, brute, mishandled, but carven on every stone:
"After me cometh a Builder. Tell him, I too have known."

Swift to my use in my trenches, where my well-planned ground-works grew,
I tumbled his quoins and his ashlars, and cut and reset them anew.
Lime I milled of his marbles; burned it, slacked it, and spread;
Taking and leaving at pleasure the gifts of the humble dead.

Yet I despised not nor gloried;...

Rudyard

On A Corkscrew

Though I, alas! a prisoner be,
My trade is prisoners to set free.
No slave his lord's commands obeys
With such insinuating ways.
My genius piercing, sharp, and bright,
Wherein the men of wit delight.
The clergy keep me for their ease,
And turn and wind me as they please.
A new and wondrous art I show
Of raising spirits from below;
In scarlet some, and some in white;
They rise, walk round, yet never fright.
In at each mouth the spirits pass,
Distinctly seen as through a glass:
O'er head and body make a rout,
And drive at last all secrets out;
And still, the more I show my art,
The more they open every heart.
    A greater chemist none than I
Who, from materials hard and dry,
Have taught men to extract with skill
More precious juice than...

Jonathan Swift

The Abbey Mason

(Inventor of the "Perpendicular" Style of Gothic Architecture)



The new-vamped Abbey shaped apace
In the fourteenth century of grace;

(The church which, at an after date,
Acquired cathedral rank and state.)

Panel and circumscribing wall
Of latest feature, trim and tall,

Rose roundabout the Norman core
In prouder pose than theretofore,

Encasing magically the old
With parpend ashlars manifold.

The trowels rang out, and tracery
Appeared where blanks had used to be.

Men toiled for pleasure more than pay,
And all went smoothly day by day,

Till, in due course, the transept part
Engrossed the master-mason's art.

- Home-coming thence he tossed and turned
Throughout the night till the new sun bu...

Thomas Hardy