General Rules of the Freemasons, with a Discourse on the Purpose of Masonry

[not be permitted to] take root in a new Brother A fellow member of the lodge, however little experience he may have; they are far too dangerous because they are highly punishable Likely referring to internal Masonic discipline or loss of reputation rather than criminal law, and they rob him of all hope of advancing further in the degrees of our Order.

One can assure everyone that the Order is most kind and most grateful; however, at the same time, he must also know that it takes its revenge on its traitors or careless members by first leaving them to their fate and then, with the loss of all improvement, severing them as rotten members from its beautiful body This "beautiful body" is a metaphor for the collective unity of the Masonic fraternity.

§. II.

On the General Mindset

of a Freemason.

Every human being has their own unique mindset original: "Denkungsart"; an 18th-century term for a person's intellectual character or way of thinking, from which their sentiments thereafter arise. This mindset is almost as varied as there are individual people, and the similarity that is found among the