Something like that. IIRC, Franklin, Jefferson and such were deists, i.e. believing that there’s something godlike and numinous but that something is not the Abrahamic God or anything similar, but rather some kind of sacred principle of being or something.
IIRC, Freemasonry requires one to purport to believe in a supreme being, though that is so loosely defined that one can fill the gap with a tautological definition.
It’s a Masonic symbol, and Freemasonry was fashionable at the time
Didn’t they go secular because freemasonry is essentially gnostic and sees all religion as tending towards the divine realisation?
Something like that. IIRC, Franklin, Jefferson and such were deists, i.e. believing that there’s something godlike and numinous but that something is not the Abrahamic God or anything similar, but rather some kind of sacred principle of being or something.
IIRC, Freemasonry requires one to purport to believe in a supreme being, though that is so loosely defined that one can fill the gap with a tautological definition.