Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 14.djvu/865

* ODD FELLOWS. 735 ODE. pendent of the Sovereign Grand Lodge and con- ferred its own degrees. The local organizations were known as 'temples.' The movement spread, and the danger of a schism impelled the Sov- ereign Grand Lodge in 1884 to yield to the demand for a recognized military degree. The Patriarchs Militant were then organized and the new military degree was approved. Only en- campment members who have taken the Royal Purple degree are eligible. The jjatriarchs have a complete military organization. The subordi- nate bodies are known as "cantons,' and each is commanded b}- a captain. The cantons are or- ganized into battalions, the battalions into regi- ments, the regiments into brigades, and the brigades into divisions, with officers of cor- responding rank. The whole 'army' is com- manded by a lieutenant-general, and the grand sire of the Sovereign Grand Lodge is ex-officio gcncral-inchief. The Rebekah degree for women members is an important branch of the order. It was es- tablished in 1851, and is intended to bring the social benefits of Odd Fellowship within the reach of the female members of the families of living or deceased members of the order. Males are also admitted under the Rebekah degree into the encampment branch of the order. The symbols in use in the lodges for the purpose of imparting instruction are: the AU-Seeiitg Eye, representing the omniscience of God ; the Skull and Cross Bones, a reminder of mortalit}-; the Three Links, representing Friendship, Love, and Truth ; the Scythe, denoting man's fading char- acter; the Bow and Arroic and Quiver, designat- ing the feeling of mutual defense to be cultivated; the Bundle of Rods, emblem of strength in union; the Heart and Band, incentives to love and mercy; the Globe, man's earthly home; the Ark of the Covenant, the repository of God's grace and His goodness to man; the Serpent, teaching the wisdom of prudence; the Scales a)id Sicord, eml)Iematic o( justice; the Bible, the source of truth: the Bour-ylass, the flight of time; and the Co/fin, emblematic of death. The emblems in use in the Encampment and Patriarchs ililitant are as follows: the Three Pillars, representative of Faith, Hope, and Char- ity; the Tent, hospitality; the Altar of Sacrifice, reminder of the simple worship offered by the Patriarchs; the Tables of Slone, the Ten Com- mandments; the Pilr/rim's Scrip, Sandals, and Staff, representing the journey of life; the Croitn, the Patriarch's power and dignity; and the Shep- herd's Crook and ^yarrior's Su:ord^ defense of the helpless. The emblems of the Rebekah degree are the Bee Hive, representing order and industry; the Dove, constancy; the Moon and Seven Stars. denoting national truth; and the Lily, emblem of purity. The results shown by the records of the order in the fulfillment of the objects of its existence, viz. the visitation of the sick, the relief of the distressed, the burial of the dead, and the educa- tion of the orphan, from 1S30 to the close of the year 1001, are as follows: There were, besides the Sovereign Grand Lodge, fi quasi-independent Grand Lodges in foreign countries: 06 Grand Lodges in the I'nited States and Canada : .55 Grand Encampments; 12.702 subordinate lodges; 2780 subordinate encampments; 1.002.272 lodge members; 145,138 encampment members; 40 Rebekah assemblies ; 5750 Rebekah lodges ; 373,- 053 Rebekah lodge members; number of members relieved, 2,565,904; and widowed families suc- cored, 250.606. The total revenue fur the period was .$240,430,422, and the total expenditure for relief .$92,605,214. The chief oHicer of the order is known as the Grand Sire. ODE (Lat. oda, ode, from Gk. ud//, song, from aeiSciv, aedein, a6tiv, adein, to sing). Origi- nally, a poem to be sung to the accompaniment of some musical instrument, as the lyre. The poem and the music were inseparable. The simpler form of the Greek ode for a single voice was cultivated by Sappho, AlcEeus, Anacreon, and other ^Eolian .poets. The choral ode to be sung, not by a single voice, but by a group, was in- vented by the Dorians. To Alcnian of Sparta belongs the innovation of dividing the chorus into two parts, called the strophe (the turn) and the antistrophe (the counter-turn), in which the performers turn to the right and to the left, the one group answering the other. Stesi- chorus of Sicily added a third part called the epode (after-song), which was sung by the en- tire chorus after their movements to the right and to the left. The choral ode, consisting thus of the strophe, the antistrophe, and the epode, was adapted by Simonides of Ceos to the war- like Dorian music. He was followed by Pindar, the greatest lyric poet of Greece. Of Pindar's work there are extant, besides several fragments, forty-four odes of victory, composed for the na- tional games. Each ode has its own complicated metrical structure, corresponding to its own music. The simpler Greek measures were imi- tated in Latin by Catullus and Horace. See Greek SIusic. The modern ode, dating from the Renaissance, was inspired by Horace and Pindar. It has, of course, undergone many modifications, consequent upon the divorce of verse and musical accom- paniment. But it generally shows whence it came by its stanzaic structure and its direct address to some person or object. It is lofty in theme, and more impersonal than the ordinary lyric. Among the first English writers of odes, in imitation of Horace or Pindar, or of both, are Ben Jonson, Crashaw, Milton, Cowley, Mar- veil, Dryden, Collins, and Gray. Marvell's ode on the return of Cromwell from Ireland is one of the best in the Horatian manner ; but Gray best understood Pindar. Gray divides his Progress of Poesy into three stanzas, each having forty-one lines; each stanza is further divided into strophe, antistrophe, and epode; and the three parts of each stanza are identical in form. Collins, with admirable art, employed a less elaborate structure, and most English poets have followed him rather than Gra}'. Indeed, the ode as now written is only a succession of stanzas in lines of vai-ying length and metre. These stanzas, in verse and rhyme, may pursue either a regular or an irregular order, so falling into one or the other of the two great classes into which modern odes are divided. Each type creates its own specific forms, which in either case may be of an almost endless variety; but in the regular ode the stanzaic form is either the same from stanza to stanza, or varies accord- ing to a fixed principle, while in the irregular ode the form is determined solely by the poet's varving mood and alters in the freest manner