At the grave the Lodge forms a circle or semicircle. The Master and other officers of the Lodge take their position at the head of the grave; the Tyler behind the Master, and the mourners at the foot. The religious burial service of the church (if there be any) should be first performed, after which the Masonic service begins: The following passage of Scripture, from Ecclesiastes, chapter xii, verses 1-7, is read: Chaplain: Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them; while the sun, or the light, or the moon, or the stars be not darkened, nor the clouds return after the rain; in the day when the keepers of the house shall tremble, and the strong men shall bow themselves, and the grinders cease because they are few, and those that look out of the windows be darkened; and the doors shall be shut in the streets, when the sound of the grinding is low; and he shall rise up at the voice of the bird, and all the daughters of music shall be brought low; also when they shall be afraid of that which is high, and fears shall be in the way, and the almond tree shall flourish, and the grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail; because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets; or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern. Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was, and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it. Master: One by one they pass away--the brothers of our adoption, the companions of our choice. A brother whose hand we have clasped in the bonds of fraternal fellowship now lies before us in the rigid embrace of death. All that remains of one near and dear to us is passing from our sight, and we know that we shall meet him on earth no more. We, who knew him so well in our brotherhood, feel that in his departure from among the living, something has gone out of our own lives that can never be again. Thus, as human ties are broken, the world becomes less and less, and the hope to be reunited with friends who are gone, grows more and more. Here is immediate compensation, which, while it cannot assuage our grief, may teach resignation to the inevitable doom of all things mortal. While we stand around the open grave, in the presence of a body once, and so lately, warm with life and animate with thought, now lingering for a brief moment at the dark portal of the tomb--like a beam of holy light the belief must come, this cannot be all there is of day. Stricken human nature cries out: There must be a dawn beyond this darkness and a never setting sun, while this short life is but a morning star.