The Ornaments of a Lodge

General Ahiman Rezon, by Daniel Sickels, [1868], at sacred-texts.com

The Ornaments of a Lodge

Are the MOSAIC PAVEMENT, the INDENTED TESSEL, and the BLAZING STAR.

The Mosaic Pavement is a representation of the ground-floor of King Solomon's Temple; the Indented Tessel, ^* of that beautiful tesselated

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border or skirting which surrounded it. The Mosaic Pavement is emblematical of human life, checkered with good and evil; the Indented Tessel, or Tesselated Border, of the manifold blessings and comforts which constantly surround us, and which we hope to enjoy by a firm reliance on Divine Providence, which is hieroglyphically represented by the Blazing Star in the center.

As the steps of man are tried in the various and uncertain incidents of life; as our days are checkered with a strange contrariety of events, and our passage through this existence, though sometimes attended with prosperous circumstances, is often beset by a multitude of evils; hence is the Lodge furnished with Mosaic work, to remind us of the precariousness of our state on earth: to-day, our feet tread in prosperity; to-morrow, we totter on the uneven paths of weakness, temptation, and adversity. While this emblem is before us, we are instructed to boast of nothing; to have compassion, and give aid to those who are in adversity; to walk uprightly, and with humility; for such is this existence, that there is no station in which pride can be stably founded: all men, in birth and in the grave, are on a level. While we tread on this Mosaic work, let our ideas return to the original, which it copies; and let every Freemason act as the dictates of reason prompt him to live in brotherly love.

Footnotes

81:* The Indented Tessel is a border of stones, of various colors, plead around the pavement, cut or notched into inequalities resembling teeth.