demonstrate that they were trained masons when they
moved from site to site. In the 1600s, these operative
lodges began to accept non-operatives as “gentlemen
masons”. Gradually these non-operatives took over the
lodges and turned them from operative to ‘free and
accepted’ or ‘speculative’ lodges.The other theory is that
in the late 1500s and early 1600s, there was a group
which was interested in the promotion of religious and
political tolerance in an age of great intolerance when
differences of opinion on matters of religion and politics
were to lead to bloody civil war. In forming Freemasonry,
they were trying to make better men and build a better
world. As the means of teaching in those days was by
allegory and symbolism, they took the idea of building as
the central allegory on which to form their system. The
18
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