Duncan's Ritual of Freemasonry: Making of a Master Mason: The 5 lb Setting-maul

[HopeHoops]

From page 103 of "Duncan's Ritual of Freemasonry":

"It is the general belief (and would be readily inferred from most exposures of Masonry) that a candidate
is knocked down with a large setting-maul kept for that purpose, but no reasonably sane person would for
one moment entertain any such idea of the ceremony of making a Master Mason. The candidate is not
intentionally injured in any Degree of Masonry, impressions of a lasting nature being all that are
intended by the ceremonies."

http://books.google.com/books?id=UAzgHv4JJrAC&pg=PA103&lpg=PA103&dq=duncans+ritual+of+free+masonry+setting+maul&source=bl&ots=iPgIeYoK7Z&sig=rkZJ_sthew1l2tz2svfvas3O7TA&hl=en&ei=nhCwSpaELOG_tgfywsmmCA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1#v=onepage&q=&f=false

I found this book in a used book store in 1982 or so and gave it to a friend of mine by the same name. The setting-maul passage became a "Monty Python" quote for us. I have subsequently secured another copy and apparently the full text is available online now.