Elizabethan Pre-Masons

So, I've finished reading the play about Elizabeth I - If You Know Not Me, You Know Nobody.

When writing my first post about the play (Guarded Words Around A Guarded Princess) I'd almost finished Part I. Now I've read Part II as well, and it was strikingly different.

Part I really was all about Elizabeth. Telling the story of her imprisonment during the reign of her sister, Mary, and then her ascendancy to the crown following Mary's death. Part II, in contrast, barely features Elizabeth at all, with her making something of a cameo appearance towards the end.

The main storyline of Part II concerns the building of the Royal Exchange in London. The main characters being Sir Thomas Gresham, wealthy merchant and founder of the Exchange, and a wealthy haberdasher called Hobson. (A haberdasher is someone who sells fabrics, buttons and other things used to make clothes, though it also can be used to mean someone who sells clothes in general. I have to make a note of this as it's one of those words I always have to look up. What's a haberdasher, again?! Checks Google. Maybe this time it'll stick in my mind.)

I often compare these old plays to modern British sitcoms. It's a common theme on here. Yet again I couldn't help but be reminded of things like Open All Hours when reading the scenes set in the haberdashery. They were quaint and funny, and very much a reflection of everyday British life. The humour of the familiar.

There was also a funny scene later on where John Gresham, Sir Thomas's wayward nephew, gets caught with a prostitute whilst away on business in France. Then, as now, people did like a bit of bawdy humour, and these plays always have at least something to satiate the audience's appetite.

There was also a moral lesson though..

Along with the humour there was also a moral undertone. Saying that, it was more of an overtone. As it wasn't subtle. The general thrust of the play being that wealthy men should do good works with their money - in this life. The emphasis being in this life. Not just leaving money in a will, but actually doing philanthropy in the here and now.

It's all very Protestant in the sense that it's pro-work and pro-business, but also pro Christian goodwill. So, it's good to make money and get rich, but you must do good things with it.

The play begins with Thomas Gresham arranging an expensive deal to secure sugar trade with a Barbary merchant, and the Royal Exchange, of course, was founded as a place for men to conduct such business. As I read it, it felt like I was reading something close to the beginnings of the Protestant work ethic. The impulse that made British Protestants responsible for all the successful businesses of later British capitalism and the industrial revolution. (Quakers were the founders of businesses such as Lloyds, Barclays and Cadburys.)

There was also a slight Masonic undertone. Here undertone is probably the correct word. In the play they lay the foundation stone of the Royal Exchange, which is a somewhat Masonic act, though not esoterically so. Plus, a comet appears in the sky as they lay it.

To me it felt like the Freemasons before the Freemasons, if that makes sense. Pre-masons, as it were. There's this view that Freemasonry dates all the way back to ancient Egypt and whatnot, though the official record starts much later. 1717 is the general date for when modern 'speculative' freemasonry begins, though various lodges, crafts and guilds existed before then. There's never a true pinpoint genesis with these things, however my feeling is that the modern, more exciting (if that's the right word) version of Freemasonry that exists today probably has its roots in Protestantism as it looked during the period when this play was written (Elizabethan/Jacobean era).

People like to think that things begin in myth and magic, only to end in the mundane of the world they experience. However, generally things begin in the mundane and the myths and magic are added later, to satisfy the need for some sense of the unknown. Being a good Christian, working hard and doing good works is a little boring for most people. They want dragons hatched from golden eggs, not a haberdasher on a London high street.

I'm going off on a tangent here, so I apologise if you've read this far, but it reminds me of conversations I've had with friends about Scientology.

They'll say something along the lines of, "I wouldn't join Scientology, but I'd love to know what the secrets are when you get to the top."

And I'll reply, "But you know they don't have any grand secrets. L. Ron Hubbard was a science-fiction writer who literally said he was going to start his own religion. It's literally made-up. Whatever you get told when you reach the top is just something made up by a science-fiction writer."

But still they'll reply, "Yeah, but I'd still love to know."

It's depressing to see how easily the desire for a sense of meaning and purpose can be misdirected. All you have to do is paint a question mark on a red box and people will start worshipping the red box, desperate to know what's in it. So much genuine truth is rejected because it's plain. People prefer the baubles and the theatre - and the promise that some higher-up man (or extra-terrestrial, or holy angel) can open the door and hand them a cup of meaning.

To me there'll always be something more meaningful in a moment of eye contact than in anything behind any door marked secret. (Though saying that, I'm currently rewatching the X-Files, so I guess I'm just as easily entertained. Though the tension between Mulder and Scully adds a realness, or at least a relatability, to the knowing fiction.)

Anyway, I really enjoyed the humour and the gentle morals of Part II of this play. Though I was hoping for more of Elizabeth. And though we've had the detour of Scientology and the X-Files, I guess that does bring us back full circle to Elizabeth in a way. As both L. Ron Hubbard and Agent Scully were redheads.

I'll finish with a picture of Agent Scully ..cos, y'know, she's pretty.

Pretty rational and grounded in science I meant (!) Though she's also pretty moody too, like most pretty things.