Conclusion 275ing any rational support and bolstered by the eternal dream of a leftist
Utopia. For them, Freemasonry is a conjunction of this dead past and
this lifeless dream that shapes the nostalgic refuge of a few sensitive but
faded souls.
It is true that when compared with the ideal aspect of humanism,
the realities of our world are quite removed from this ideal. Who still
speaks of the sacred value of man and his creative activity, Work? Isn't
work all too often a painful and odious constraint from which we
should be liberated? Do today's Freemasons, concerned with the prob-
lems of the hour and the next day, still know how to decipher the
secrets they have in storage? Finally, are these secrets from the small,
motionless world of the artisan for whom time and eternity did not
matter have any usefulness for our large industrial societies, so complex
and overwhelmed by a rhythm that is ceaselessly accelerating? Under
these conditions, wouldn't it be better for those still smitten with spiri-
tuality to attempt to reinvigorate Freemasonry with a traditional con-
tribution from external sources, and for those whose feet remain firmly
planted on the ground to utilize their abilities on a new path that is
more rational, useful, and sure?
Some might subsequently believe that, confronted by historical
assumptions and objective analysis, Freemasonry will be reduced to
either an illusory record or a dilemma requiring abnegation or innova-
tion. In either case, the danger for Freemasonry will be enormous. Cut
from its original sources, stripped of the support of the higher order it
once held, it will soon be nothing but a mask of good conscience over
vague impulses, egotistical actions, and constraints.
Let us not speak of the well-meaning men who introduce them-
selves into the most reliable lodges with the expressed desire to share
with brothers of good will the pure and laudable tradition, but who
conceal their true desire to destroy the institution by deforming it,
opening it up to unjustified attacks, emptying it of its historical and ini-
tiatory content. These infiltrations are not new. We have already seen
the distortion of major symbols, displayed before public opinion like
trophies.
Without a healthy reaction on its behalf, Freemasonry will leave
itself open, without most of its brothers even grasping why, to some