Hello,
Since 'Studies in Freemasonry and Compagnonnage" by René Guénon has
just been published in American, it's also the perfect time to
introduce James Mackey's 'The History of Freemasonry' to those who
don't know this work yet.
'The History of Freemasonry', to which his author devoted many years
of his life, expounds and looks into most of the theories regarding
the origin and the history of this so-called initiatory organisation
for modern vaishya and shudra, from that which traces its institution
to the ancient Mysteries, that which finds a connection between the
Druids and the Freemasons, that which connects its origin with the
Crusades, that which connects the Knights Templars with Freemasonry
in Scotland to that which finds its origin in the House of Stuart and
that which makes a connection between Freemasonry and Jesuitism, and
so on. This extremely well-documented scathing and somewhat dry study
blows up most of the arguments put forward by the upholders of those
various theories, whether Freemasons or anti-Freemasons, with a
rigour which is rarely found in the works of the latter.
http://esotericfreemason.com/lodge/prospect/history-13.pdf
Thompkins&Cariou