Without further citations of examples from the religious usages of other countries, it will, I think, be conceded that the cubical stone formed an important part of the religious worship of primitive nations.  But Cudworth, Bryant, Faber, and all other distinguished writers who have treated the subject, have long since established the theory that the pagan religions were eminently symbolic.  Thus, to use the language of Dudley, the pillar or stone “was adopted as a symbol of strength and firmness,—­a symbol, also, of the divine power, and, by a ready inference, a symbol or idol of the Deity himself.” [229] And this symbolism is confirmed by Cornutus, who says that the god Hermes was represented without hands or feet, being a cubical stone, because the cubical figure betokened his solidity and stability.[230]

Thus, then, the following facts have been established, but not precisely in this order:  First, that there was a very general prevalence among the earliest nations of antiquity of the worship of stones as the representatives of Deity; secondly, that in almost every ancient temple there was a legend of a sacred or mystical stone; thirdly, that this legend is found in the masonic system; and lastly, that the mystical stone there has received the name of the “Stone of Foundation.”

Now, as in all the other systems the stone is admitted to be symbolic, and the tradition connected with it mystical, we are compelled to assume the same predicates of the masonic stone.  It, too, is symbolic, and its legend a myth or an allegory.

Of the fable, myth, or allegory, Bailly has said that, “subordinate to history and philosophy, it only deceives that it may the better instruct us.  Faithful in preserving the realities which are confided to it, it covers with its seductive envelope the lessons of the one and the truths of the other.” [231] It is from this stand-point that we are to view the allegory of the Stone of Foundation, as developed in one of the most interesting and important symbols of Masonry.

The fact that the mystical stone in all the ancient religions was a symbol of the Deity, leads us necessarily to the conclusion that the Stone of Foundation was also a symbol of Deity.  And this symbolic idea is strengthened by the tetragrammaton, or sacred name of God, that was inscribed upon it.  This ineffable name sanctifies the stone upon which it is engraved as the symbol of the Grand Architect.  It takes from it its heathen signification as an idol, and consecrates it to the worship of the true God.

The predominant idea of the Deity, in the masonic system, connects him with his creative and formative power.  God is, to the Freemason, Al Gabil, as the Arabians called him, that is, The Builder; or, as expressed in his masonic title, the Grand Architect of the Universe, by common consent abbreviated in the formula G.A.O.T.U.  Now, it is evident that no symbol could so appropriately suit him in this character as the Stone of Foundation, upon which he is allegorically supposed to have erected his world.  Such a symbol closely connects the creative work of God, as a pattern and exemplar, with the workman’s erection of his temporal building on a similar foundation stone.