Irish Jacobitism and Freemasonry Sean J Murphy Note, 7 September 2020: This is the author’s draft of an article published in the journal Eighteenth-Century Ireland, vol 9, 1994, pp 75-82 (accessible via JSTOR). There has been a dramatic increase in scholarly research and publications relating to Freemasonry in the past quarter century and it is hoped to revise the present article in the light of some of this work. See for example publications freely accessible via Academia.edu: Róbert Péter (https://u-szeged.academia.edu/RobertPeter), Ric Berman (https://oxfordbrookes.academia.edu/RICHARDBERMAN) and Marsha Schuchard (https://independent.academia.edu/marshaschuchard). In particular, see Róbert Péter, ‘A Historiography of Freemasonry in the British Isles in Light of Recent Scholarship’, https://www.academia.edu/29389098, pp xiii-xx. Jacobitism and Freemasonry are two subjects which have in the past been neglected or disregarded by professional historians. 1 Jacobitism of course fell victim to the victorious 'Whig interpretation of history', although in recent years it has been the subject of a growing body of work in Britain, 2 and is now being studied more closely in this country as well. 3 Freemasonry has been overlooked to an even greater degree, being considered in some quarters as a subject best left to the attentions of masonic enthusiasts, to those with 'feet ... planted firmly in the clouds'. 4 Yet Freemasonry, and in particular the questions of its origins and its role in the era of Enlightenment and revolution, are now increasingly the subject of scholarly study, 5 and interest has been stirring in this country also. 6 While the relationship between radicalism and Freemasonry in the eighteenth century has been the area most studied, the connection between Jacobitism and Freemasonry is now receiving more attention. 7 In the present paper, we will consider Irish Jacobitism and Freemasonry together in the period from the late seventeenth to the mid-eighteenth century, and it will be seen that there were intimate and significant links between the two movements. The sources used in this preliminary survey are largely secondary and sometimes little referred to, and it is hardly necessary to add that further and more detailed research is required in unpublished documents in archives in Ireland, Britain and Europe. The Jacobite movement had as its principal aim the restoration of the Stuarts to the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland, in the person first of James II, and subsequently of his son James III, the 'Old Pretender', and his grandson, Prince Charles Edward, the 'Young Pretender'. The Jacobites looked primarily to France for aid in recovering what they saw as their rightful inheritance, and as is well-known, the strong Irish and mostly Catholic component of the movement hoped through a Stuart restoration to reverse the dispossession which had followed the Williamite victories of 1688-91, and which was maintained by the Hanoverian succession in 1714. Freemasonry was and continues to be a secret or at least semi-secret fraternity with an arcane system of rituals and stated social and philanthropic purposes, but has also periodically attracted suspicions of possessing concealed political or self-serving agendas. An important distinction is made between the original 'operative' Freemasonry, when only working masons were members, and the later 'speculative' Freemasonry which attracted and eventually came to be dominated by those not working in the trade. The portrayal of God as a benign 'Great Architect of the Universe', the use of quasi-magical symbolism, the drawing of moral analogies from good building practices, advancement by degrees, legends concerning the Temple of Solomon, ancient Egypt and the Knights Templar, these and other esoteric elements of Freemasonry continue to fascinate modern devotees as much as they did adherents during