626 THE POLISH FOURTH. 



who direct, whatever the government that rules them, let it be their 

 object to concentrate their opinions, their desires, and their efforts. 

 Let the nation again become herself, and then one day she may re- 

 cover her ancient independence and her liberty/' 



Such were the patriotic views of Dombrowski. Whether this gene- 

 ral really made use of the words attributed to him, or whether they 

 were placed to his account in order to exculpate others, it is certain 

 that it was Lukasenski who first conceived the idea of carrying them 

 into execution. 



Profiting by the toleration of the police towards freemasonry, he 

 organized, in concert with some of his friends, a private association, 

 under the name of national freemasonry. In its external form anala- 

 gous to the ordinary masonic institutions, the two rites differed in 

 this sense that, instead of having in view a universal fraternity, the 

 national freemasonry was completely Polish in its operation. All the 

 symbols and ceremonies suggested to the brothers the name of Poland : 

 they wore the national colours ; the great historical names served 

 them as pass-words ; and the catechism breathed but the love of the 

 country, and the oath inculcated fidelity unto death. 



Such an association was certainly of a nature to give umbrage to 

 the government : this the founders felt ; and in order to veil the real 

 objects of the association, they skilfully confounded the duties they 

 owed the king with those they owed the country. They dwelt upon 

 the works of benevolence, that to the profane appeared to be the ob- 

 ject of the institutions: they thus blinded the public as to its lofty 

 conception. This, in fact, was only revealed to the brothers in the 

 fourth degree a grade reserved to the founders and their most con- 

 fidential friends : and this conception was to revive the spirit of na- 

 tionality throughout all the provinces of the kingdom, and, on the 

 first occasion, to avail themselves of these vast elements to recognize 

 the Polish independence. 



From Warsaw the national freemasonry spread through all the 

 provinces. There were few regiments that had not their private lodge, 

 besides the new association formed among the officers of the old army 

 of Poniotowski a host of apostles. Aware of this rapid progress, 

 Lukasenski thought himself, in 1821, sufficiently strong to raise the 

 country, if Yermolof, destined by the Emperor Alexander, at the 

 head of 100,000 Russians, to support the Austrians, had commenced 

 their march. 



Unfortunately, at this period, freemasonry was forbidden in the 

 Russian empire and the kingdom of Poland ; and thus the national free- 

 masonry lost all those pretexts that had hitherto lulled the mistrust of 

 the authorities. The most timid among the united spoke already of 

 abandoning a re-union positively forbidden by the laws ; the more 

 ardent, on the contrary, persisted in their original views, and under- 

 took to transform the work of the prudent Lukasenski into Carbo- 

 narism. In the grand duchy of Posen the associates adopted even the 

 denomination of scythe-bearers. In order to regenerate the ancient 

 association, either by concentrating its direction or by giving it a new 

 form, there was, in 1821, a meeting of several chiefs, who came to 

 Warsaw from the extremities of Poland. Through the influence of 



