Page:Manual of the Lodge.pdf/192

Rh SECTION II.

ANNUAL INSTALLATION OF THE OFFICERS OF A LODGE.



T every annual election in a Subordinate Lodge, it is necessary that the officers should be installed. This ceremony may be performed by any Past Master.

The officers having been constitutionally elected, and the Lodge being opened in the third degree of Masonry, the Worshipful Master of the last year, or some other Past Master, takes the chair.

The Master elect is then conducted by some Past Master, if possible, and if not, by an old Master Mason, in front of the pedestal of the East. The new Master advances with the usual distinctive forms, and his conductor says:

Worshipful Sir, I here present before you Brother A. B., who has been duly elected to serve this Lodge as Worshipful Master, for the ensuing Masonic year, and who now declares himself ready for installation.

The new Master then turning and facing the brethren, the presiding officer says:

Brethren, you now behold before you, Brother A. B., who has been duly elected to serve this Lodge as Worshipful Master, and who now declares himself ready for installation. If any of you have any reasons to urge why he should not be installed, you will make them known now, or else forever hereafter hold your peace. Hearing no objections, I shall proceed to install him.