Bro. George Oliver was initiated in 1801 at age 18 (by dispensation due toage) by his father, The Rev. Samuel Oliver, in Saint Peter's Lodge No. 442 inthe city of Peterborough, he entered Holy Orders in the Church of England in1813, and in 1835 the Archbishop of Canterbury conferred upon him the degreeof Doctor of Divinity. He read with great attention every Masonic book hecould obtain, and began to collect a store of knowledge which he afterward usedwith so much advantage to the Craft. In 1829, he edited a new edition ofWilliam Preston's "Illustrations of Masonry."His own first contribution to the literature of Freemasonry was a worktitled "The Antiquities of Freemasonry" and was published in 1839. His next worktitled "The Star in the East", intended to show, from the testimony of Masonicwriters, the connection between Freemasonry and religion. In 1841 hepublished his 12 lectures on "The Signs and Symbols of Freemasonry" , in which hewent into learned detail of the history and signification of all the recognizedsymbols of the Order. This was followed by 12 lectures on "The History ofInitiation", comprising a detailed account of the Rites and Ceremonies,Doctrines and Discipline, of all the Secret and Mysterious Institutions of theAncient World. The professed object of the author was to show the resemblancesbetween these ancient systems of initiation and the Masonic, and to trace them toa common origin - a theory which, under some modification, has been verygenerally accepted by Masonic scholars.His "Institutes of Masonic Jurisprudence" , was a book in which he expressedviews of law that did not meet with the universal concurrence of his Englishreaders. Besides these elaborate works, Doctor Oliver was a constantcontributor to the early volumes of the London Freemasons Quarterly Review, andpublished a valuable article, on the Gothic Constitutions, in the AmericanQuarterly Review of Freemasonry. It seems the great error of Doctor Oliver, as aMasonic teacher, was a too easy credulity or a too great warmth of imagination,which led him to accept without hesitation the crude theories of previouswriters, and to recognize documents and legends as unquestionably authenticwhose truthfulness subsequent researches have led most Masonic scholars to doubtor to deny.In 1815 Oliver became a member of the Ancient & Accepted Rite in England andin 1845 was promoted by the SC of England to the 33rd Degree and in the same year wasappointed Lieutenant Grand Commander, being advanced in 1850 to the highestdignity, that of Most Puissant Sovereign Grand Commander. In 1846 the GrandLodge of Massachusetts conferred upon him the honorary rank of Deputy GrandMaster.
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