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HUMBOLDT LIBRARY 
 
 POPULAR SCIENCE LITERATURE. 
 
 No. 62.] 
 
 NEW YORK : J. FITZGERALD. 
 
 November, 1884. Entered at the New York Post-Office as Second-Class Matter. I ^Numbers 1 
 
 THE 
 
 OF THE 
 
 ANCIENT WOR 
 
 BY GEORGE RAWLINSON, M.A. 
 
 |J 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 " Religio est, quae superioris cujusdam na- 
 turae, quam Divinam vocant, curam caerimo- 
 niamque affert." Cic. De Inventione, ii. 53. 
 
 1, IT is the fashion of the day to 
 speculate on the origins of things. 
 Not content with observing the mech- 
 anism of the heavens, astronomers dis- 
 cuss the formation of the material uni- 
 verse, and seek in the phenomena 
 which constitute the subject-matter of 
 their science for " Vestiges of Crea- 
 tion." Natural philosophers propound 
 theories of the "Origin of Species," 
 and the primitive condition of man. 
 Comparative philologists are no longer 
 satisfied to dissect languages, com- 
 pare roots, or contrast systems of 
 grammar, but regard it as incumbent 
 upon them to put forward views re- 
 specting the first beginnings of lan- 
 guage itself. 
 
 2. To deal with facts is thought to 
 be a humdrum and commonplace em- 
 ployment of the intellect, one fitted for 
 the dull ages when men were content 
 to plod, and when progress, develop- 
 ment, " the higher criticism " were un- 
 known. The intellect now takes loft- 
 
 ier flights. Conjecture is found to be 
 more amusing than induction, and an 
 ingenious hypothesis to be more at- 
 tractive than a proved law. Our " ad- 
 vanced thinkers " advance to the fur- 
 thest limits of human knowledge, 
 sometimes even beyond them ; and be- 
 witch us with speculations, which are 
 as beautiful, and as unsubstantial, as 
 the bubbles which a child produces 
 with a little soap and water and a to- 
 bacco-pipe. 
 
 3. Nor does even religion escape. 
 The historical method of inquiry into 
 the past facts of religion is in danger 
 of being superseded by speculations 
 concerning what is called its " philos- 
 ophy," or its " science." We are con- 
 tinually invited to accept the views of 
 this or that theorist respecting the 
 origin of all religions, which are attrib- 
 uted either to a common innate idea 
 or instinct, or else to a common mode 
 of reasoning upon the phenomena and 
 experiences of human life. While the 
 facts of ancient religions are only just 
 emerging from the profound obscurity 
 that has hitherto rested upon them, 
 fancy is busy constructing schemes 
 and systems, which have about as 
 
2 [SOj 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 much reality as the imaginations of a j and Babylonians, Iranians, Sanskrit- 
 novelist or the day-dreams of an Al- ic Indians, Phoenicians, Etruscans, 
 
 Greeks, and Romans. 
 
 The religion of the Jews has been 
 omitted, as sufficiently well known to 
 all educated persons. The religions 
 of ancient barbarous races have been 
 excluded, as not having come down to 
 us in any detail, or upon sufficiently 
 trustworthy evidence. The eight na- 
 tions selected have, on the contrary, 
 left monuments and writings, more 
 or less extensive, from which it has 
 seemed to be possible to give a tolera- 
 bly full account of their religious be- 
 liefs, and one on which a fair degree 
 of dependence may be placed. No 
 doubt, as time goes on, and fresh dis- 
 coveries are made of ancient docu- 
 
 naschar. The patient toil, the care- 
 ful investigation which real Science 
 requires as the necessary basis upon 
 which generalization must proceed, 
 and systems be built up, is discarded 
 for the " short and easy method " of 
 jumping to conclusions and laying 
 down as certainties what are, at the 
 best, "guesses at truth." 
 
 4. It is not the aim of the present 
 writer to produce a " Science of Re- 
 ligion," or even to speculate on the 
 possibility of such a science being ul- 
 timately elaborated when all the facts 
 are fully known. He has set himself 
 a more prosaic and less ambitious 
 task that, namely, of collecting ma- 
 
 terials which may serve as a portion rnents, or an increased insight ob- 
 of the data, when the time comes, if it j tained into the true meaning of their 
 ever comes, for the construction of | contents, we shall come to know much 
 the science in question. A building more than we know at present on the 
 
 cannot be erected without materials ; 
 a true science cannot be constructed 
 without ample data. 
 
 5. Careful inquiries into the real 
 nature of historical religions are nec- 
 essary preliminaries to the formation 
 of any general theories on the subject 
 of religion worth the paper upon which 
 they are written. And such inquiries 
 have, moreover, a value in themselves. 
 " The proper study of mankind is 
 man ; " and the past history of the hu- 
 man race possesses an undying inter- 
 est for the greater portion of educated 
 human kind. Of that past history 
 there is no branch more instructive, 
 and few more entertaining, than that 
 which deals with religious beliefs, 
 opinions, and practices. Religion is 
 the most important element in the 
 thought of a nation ; and it is by study- 
 ing their religibns that we obtain the 
 best clue to the inner life and true 
 character of the various peoples who 
 have played an important part in the 
 drama of human affairs. 
 
 6. In the ensuing pages the relig- 
 ious tenets and practices of eight prin- 
 cipal nations of antiquity are passed 
 in review the nations being those 
 with which ancient history is chiefly 
 concerned the Egyptians. Assyrians 
 
 subject here handled ; but it is confi- 
 dently believed that further research 
 and study will only supplement, and 
 not contradict, the views which are 
 here put forward. The author will 
 gladly see the sketch which he here 
 attempts filled up and completed by 
 others. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE RELIGION OF THE ANCIENT 
 EGYPTIANS. 
 
 . . . 6eoaifl(; Trt 
 /ndAtora KCLVTUV avdpuiruv, HEROD, ii. 
 
 7. THE religions of the ancient 
 world, if we except Judaism, seem to 
 have been, all of them, more or less 
 polytheistic ; but the polytheism grew 
 up in different ways, was carried out 
 to very different lengths, and pro- 
 ceeded upon considerably varying 
 principles. In some places natural 
 objects and operations appear to have 
 presented themselves to the unso- 
 phisticated mind of man as mysteri- 
 ous, wonderful, divine ; and light, fire, 
 the air, the sun, the moon, the dawn, 
 the cloud, the stream, the storm, the 
 lightning, drew his attention sepa- 
 ratelv and distinctly, each having 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [81] 
 
 qualities at which he marveled, each, 
 as he thought, instinct with life, and 
 each, therefore, regarded as a Power, 
 a Being the natural and proper ob- 
 ject of worship and reverence. Else- 
 where, men seem to have begun with 
 a dim and faint appreciation of a 
 single mysterious power in the world 
 without them, and to have gradually 
 divided this power up into its various 
 manifestations, which by degrees be- 
 came separate and distinct beings. 
 The process in this case might stop 
 short after a few steps had been 
 taken, or it might be carried on 
 almost interminably, until a pantheon 
 had been formed in which the mind 
 lost itself. 
 
 8. Where the polytheism grew up 
 out of an analysis, the principle of 
 the division might be either physical 
 or metaphysical ; a separation of nat- 
 ure into its parts, or an analysis of 
 the Being presiding over nature into 
 his various .powers and attributes. 
 Or these two processes might be com- 
 bined and intermixed, the pantheon 
 being thus still further enlarged at 
 the expense of some confusion of 
 thought and complexity of arrange- 
 ment. Again, occasionally, there 
 was a further enlargement and com- 
 plication, in consequence of the de- 
 sire to embrace in one system analy- 
 ses which were really distinct, or to 
 
 multitudinousness, its complexity, 
 and the connection of this latter feat- 
 ure with early local diversities in the 
 names and offices of the gods. Wil- 
 kinson, who does not profess to ex- 
 haust the subject, enumerates seventy- 
 three divinities, and gives their 
 several names and forms.* Birch 
 has a list of sixty-three "principal 
 deities,"t and notes that " others per- 
 sonified the elements, or presided 
 over the operations of nature, the 
 seasons, and events."t It is not, 
 perhaps, too much to say, that the 
 Egyptian pantheon in its final form 
 comprised some hundreds of gods 
 and goddesses, each known under a 
 different name, and each discharging 
 more or less peculiar functions. We 
 say, "each discharging more or less 
 peculiar functions," since some deities 
 were so nearly alike, came so close 
 the one to the other, that their iden- 
 tity or diversity is a moot point, still 
 disputed among Egyptologists. In 
 other cases the diversity is greater, 
 yet still the features possessed in 
 common are so numerous that the 
 gods can scarcely be considered 
 wholly distinct, and, indeed, are not 
 unfrequently confounded together 
 and blended into a single personage. 
 We hear of Amen-Ra, Amen-Kneph, 
 Ra-Harmachis, Isis-Selk, Phthah-So- 
 kari-Osiris, and the like. There is 
 
 comprise in a single national religion \ reason to believe that a main cause of 
 
 local diversities of arrangement or 
 nomenclature, or even to admit into a 
 system based on one principle ele- 
 ments which belonged properly to 
 systems based upon others. The 
 whole result in such a case was one 
 of extensive complexity, and even 
 contradiction; a tangle was produced 
 which it was scarcely possible to un- 
 ravel. The system, however, gained 
 in richness and variety what it lost in 
 logical sequence and intelligibility, 
 and continued to have a firm hold 
 on the minds of many when religions 
 of greater internal consistency had 
 lost their power. 
 
 9. The Egyptian polytheism was of 
 the character last described. Its 
 most striking characteristics were its 
 
 this multiplication of deities, nearly 
 or quite the same, which at first sight 
 seems so strange and unaccountable, 
 is to be found in the originally local 
 character of many of the gods, and 
 the subsequent admission of purely 
 provincial deities into the general 
 pantheon. 
 
 10. With a view to educe order out 
 
 *" Manners and Customs of the Ancient 
 Egyptians," vols. iv. and v. For the forms, 
 see his " Supplement," plates 21 to 72. 
 
 t See his " Dictionary of Hieroglyphics " in 
 Bunsen's " Egypt," vol. v. pp. 581-583. 
 
 J " Guide to the British Museum," p. 4. 
 
 An inscription of Rameses II. speaks 
 of " the thousand gods, the gods male, the 
 gods female, those which are of the. land of 
 Egypt " (" Records of the Past," vol. iv. p. 
 31) ; but this phrase is no. doubt rhetorical. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 of this multitudinous confusion, at- 
 tempts were made by the Greeks, 
 and perhaps by some of the later 
 Egyptians themselves, to classify the 
 deities, and divide them into certain 
 ranks or orders, each of which should 
 comprise a certain definite number. 
 Herodotus speaks of a first, a second, 
 and a third order,* and assigns posi- 
 tively to the first order eight, and to 
 the second twelve gods, leaving the 
 third rank indeterminate. Some 
 traces of a similar classification are 
 found in some of the native writers ;f 
 and it is generally agreed that a dis- 
 tinction of ranks was recognized ; 
 but when an endeavor is made to 
 specify the gods of each rank, insur- 
 mountable difficulties present them- 
 selves. It seems clear that even the 
 first eight gods were not established 
 by the general consent of the nation 
 in all parts of Egypt, and probable 
 that in one and the same place they 
 were not always the same at different 
 periods. According to what seems 
 the earliest tradition, the eight names 
 were those of Phthah, Ra, Shu (or 
 Kneph),$ Seb, Osiris, Isis, Set, and 
 Horus ; according to the latest re- 
 searches, they were, at Memphis, 
 Phthah, Shu, Tefnu, Seb, Nu (or 
 Nut), Osiris, Isis, and Athor ; while 
 at Thebes they were Ammon, Mentu, 
 Turn (or Atum), Shu, Seb, Osiris, 
 Set, and Horus. Others have 
 thought to find them in Ammon, 
 Khem, Maut, Kneph, Sati, Phthah, 
 Neith, and Raj or in this list with a 
 single change that of the last name, 
 for which it is proposed to substitute 
 that of Bast or Pasht.H" It is evident 
 that, while the chief authorities are 
 
 * Herod, ii. 43. 
 
 t As Manetho (ap. Euseb. " Chron. Can." 
 i. 19). 
 
 t The name given is Agathodaemon, who 
 is thought to represent one or other of these 
 gods. 
 
 See Birch's "Egypt from the Earliest 
 Times to B.C. 300," Introduction, pp. x. xi., 
 and compare " Guide to the British Muse- 
 um," p. 12. 
 
 || Bunsen's "Egypt's Place in Ancient 
 History," vol. i. pp. 366-367. 
 
 Tf Wilkinson, in Rawlinson's " Herodotus," 
 vol. ii. pp. 284-286 (32d edition). 
 
 thus at variance, no certain list of 
 even the eight great gods can be put 
 forward. 
 
 11. The twelve gods of the second 
 order are still more indeterminate. 
 Two lists have been formulated, one 
 by Sir G. Wilkinson, and the other by 
 the late Baron Bunsen, but each in- 
 cludes three deities which are excluded 
 by the other. 1 * The formation of such 
 lists is mere guess-work ; and the con- 
 clusion to be drawn from the attempts 
 made is that, while the Egyptians rec- 
 ognized a gradation of ranks among^ 
 their deities, and assigned to some a 
 position of decided superiority, to 
 others one, comparatively speaking, 
 inferior, there was no " hard-and-fast 
 line " separating rank from rank, or 
 order from order, nor was any definite 
 number of divinities reckoned in any 
 division. 
 
 12. Still, we can easily particularize 
 the principal divinities, the gods which 
 were the chief objects of worship, 
 either in the main centers of popu- 
 lation, or throughout the country. 
 There can be no doubt that to this 
 class belong Ammon, Khem, Kneph, 
 Phthah, Ra, Osiris, and Neith. Am- 
 mon was the chief god of Thebes, 
 Khem of Chemmis, or Panopolis, 
 Kneph of Elephantine, Phthah of 
 Memphis, Ra of Heliopolis, Osiris of 
 Abydos and Philae, Neith of Sais. It 
 will perhaps be a better illustration of 
 the Egyptian religion to give a partic- 
 ular though brief account of these 
 seven deities than to waste pages in 
 generalities. 
 
 13. Ammon is said to have meant, 
 etymologically, "the concealed 
 god ; " y and the idea of Ammon was 
 that of a recondite, incomprehensible 
 
 * Bunsen's list consists of 
 
 Chons *Bast *Ma Savak 
 
 Thoth *Athor Tafne Seb 
 Turn Shu Mentu Netpe ; 
 
 Wilkinson's of 
 
 *Ra Khons Shu Savak 
 
 Seb *Anouke Tafne *Seneb 
 
 Netpe Turn Thoth Mentu. 
 The peculiar names are marked with an as- 
 terisk. 
 
 t Manetho ap. Plutarch, " De Isid. et Osir." 
 s. 9 ; lamblich, " De Mysteriis," viii. 3. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 188] 
 
 divinity, remote from man, hidden, 
 mysterious, the proper object of the 
 profoundest reverence. Practically, 
 this idea was too abstract, too high- 
 flown, too metaphysical, for ordinary 
 minds to conceive of it ; and so Am- 
 mon was at an early date conjoined 
 with Ra, the Sun, and worshiped as 
 Ammon-Ra,* a very intelligible god, 
 neither more nor less than the phys- 
 ical sun, the source of light and life, 
 " the lord of existences and support 
 of all things."t 
 
 14. Khem was the generative princi- 
 ple, the power of life and growth in 
 nature. He was rudely and coarsely 
 represented as a mummied figure, with 
 phallus in front, and forms an un- 
 sightly object in the sculptures. He 
 presided primarily over the vegetable 
 world, and was the giver of fertility 
 and increase, the lord of the harvest, 
 and the patron of agriculture. But 
 the human species and the various 
 kinds of animals were also under his 
 charge, and from him obtained con- 
 tinuance. He is called, " the king of 
 the gods," "the lifter of the hand," 
 " the lord of the crown," " the power- 
 ful," and further bears the special 
 title of Kamutf, " bull of his mother," 
 in allusion to the relation which he 
 bore to Nature. 
 
 15. Kneph was the divine spirit or 
 soul considered as forming the scheme 
 of creation. His name is by some 
 connected etymologically with the 
 Egyptian word for " breath," which 
 is nef; and curious analogies are 
 traced between him and the third Per- 
 son of the Holy Trinity in the Chris- 
 tian system. || As " the Spirit of God " 
 at the time of the creation "moved 
 upon the face of the waters," so 
 Kneph is represented as the deity 
 who presides over the inundations. As 
 the heavens were made by the " breath 
 of God's mouth," so Kneph is called, 
 
 * See " Records of the Past," vol. ii. pp. 21, 
 31, etc. ; vol. iv. pp. n, 16, etc. 
 
 t Ibid. vol. ii. p. 129, 1. 12. 
 
 \ " Records of the Past," vol. viii. p. 142. 
 
 Bunsen, " Egypt's Place," vol. i. p. 375. 
 
 tl Wilkinson. " Ancient Egyptians," vol. iv. 
 p. 236. 
 
 " the god who has made the sun and 
 moon to revolve under the heaven and 
 above the world, and who has made 
 the world and all that is in it." * Some 
 representations exhibit him as a potter 
 with his wheel ; and the inscriptions 
 accompanying them assign to him the 
 formation of gods and men. It is 
 perhaps as a procreating principle 
 that he is figured commonly with the 
 head of a ram. Kneph was wor- 
 shiped chiefly in Upper Egypt, at 
 Elephantine and the Cataracts ; but 
 he was acknowledged also at Thebes, 
 at Antseopolis, and elsewhere. 
 
 1 6. Phthah, whom the Greeks iden- 
 tified with their Hephaistos, and the 
 Romans with their Vulcan, was a cre- 
 ator of a more vulgar type than Kneph 
 or Khem. He was an artisan god, the 
 actual manipulator of matter, and di- 
 rect maker of the sun, the moon, and 
 the earth. He is called, " the father 
 of the beginnings," " the first of the 
 gods of the upper world," " he who 
 adjusts the world by his hand," " the 
 lord of the beautiful countenance," 
 and " the lord of truth." f He is also 
 defined by an ancient writer \ as " the 
 god who creates with truth." We find 
 him represented under three quite dif- 
 ferent forms, as a man walking or sit- 
 ting, as a mummied figure, accompan- 
 ied by " the emblem of stability," and 
 as a pigmy or dwarf. A figure of this 
 last description provoked the ridicule 
 of Cambyses, the Persian conqueror 
 of Egypt, who "entered the grand 
 temple of Phthah at Memphis, and 
 made great sport of the image." 
 Forms of Phthah are found consist- 
 ing of two figures placed back to back, 
 and even of three figures placed at 
 an angle. These seem, however, to 
 represent combinations of Phthah 
 with other nearly allied gods, and are 
 called commonly " figures of Phthah- 
 Sokari," or of " Phthah-Sokari-Osiris." 
 
 17. Ra was the Egyptian sun-god, 
 and was especially worshiped at Heli- 
 
 * Bunsen, vol. i. p. 377. 
 t " Records of the Past," vol. viii. pp. 5-15 ; 
 Birch, " Guide to the British Museum," p. 13. 
 J lamblichus, " De Mysteriis," viii. 3. 
 Herod, iii. 37. 
 
THE RELIGIONS <JJt- i ilE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 opolis. Obelisks, according to some,* 
 n- presented his rays, and were always, 
 or usually, erected in his honor. 
 Heliopolis was certainly one of the 
 places which were thus adorned, for 
 one of the few which still stand erect 
 in Egypt is on the site of that city. 
 The kings for the most part consid- 
 ered Ra their special patron and pro- 
 tector; nay, they went so far as to 
 identify themselves with him, to use 
 his titles as their own, and to adopt 
 his name as the ordinary prefix to 
 their own names and titles. This is 
 believed by many to have been the 
 origin of the word Pharaoh, f which 
 was, it is thought, the Hebrew render- 
 ing of Ph' Ra = " the sun." Ra is 
 sometimes represented simply by a 
 disk, colored red, or by such a disk 
 with the ankh, or symbol of life, at- 
 tached to it ; but more commonly he 
 has the figure of a man, with a hawk's 
 head, and above it the disk, accom- 
 panied by plumes, or by a serpent. 
 The beetle (scarabaeus) was one of 
 his emblems. As for his titles, they 
 are too numerous to mention : the 
 " Litany of Ra " % alone contains 
 some hundreds of them. 
 
 1 8. Osiris was properly a form of 
 Ra. He was the light of the lower 
 world, the sun from the time that he 
 sinks below the horizon in the west to 
 the hour when he reappears above 
 the eastern horizon in the morning. 
 This physical idea was, however, at a 
 later date modified, and Osiris was 
 generally recognized as the perpetu- 
 ally presiding lord of the lower world, 
 the king and the judge of Hades or 
 Amenti. His worship was universal 
 throughout Egypt, but his chief tem- 
 ples were at Abydos and Philae. Or- 
 dinarily he was represented in a 
 mummied form as the god of the dead, 
 but sometimes he appears as a living 
 
 man, standing or walking. He carries 
 in his two hands the crook and the 
 flagellum or whip, and commonly 
 wears on his head the crown of Upper 
 Egypt, with a plume of ostrich feather 
 on either side of it. A special char- 
 acter of goodness attaches to him. 
 We find him called, " the manifester 
 of good," "full of goodness and 
 truth," "the beneficent spirit," "be- 
 neficent in will and words," " mild of 
 heart," " and fair and beloved of all 
 who see him." * 
 
 19. Neith, or Net, the goddess of 
 Sais, was identified by the Greeks f 
 with their Athene (Minerva), but 
 does not appear to have been really a 
 goddess of wisdom. She was the fe- 
 male correspondent of Khem, the 
 conceptive element in nature, as he 
 was the generative. Her titles are, 
 " the mother," " the mistress of 
 heaven," "the elder goddess." $ She 
 is represented in the form of a woman 
 standing, and wearing on her head the 
 crown of Lower Egypt. In her left 
 hand she carries a scepter, sometimes 
 accompanied by a bow and two ar- 
 rows ; in her right she bears the ankh, 
 or symbol of life. One of the signs 
 with which her name is written re- 
 sembles a shuttle; from which fact, 
 combined with her carrying a bow and 
 arrpws, she has been called, " the god- 
 dess of war and weaving." Her 
 worship was not very widely spread, 
 nor is she often mentioned in the in- 
 scriptions. 
 
 ^20. No part of the Egyptian religion 
 was so much developed and so multi- 
 plex as their sun worship. || Besides 
 Ra and Osiris there were at least six 
 
 * Zoega, "De Obeliscis;" Plin. "H. N." 
 xxxvi. 8, s. 14. 
 
 t So Wilkinson (in Rawlinson's " Herod- 
 otus," vol. ii. p. 181, note i) and others. 
 But the derivation from Pfi'ouro^ " the king," 
 is perhaps as probable. 
 
 J See " Records of the Past," vol. viii. pp. 
 105-128. 
 
 Herod, ii. 42, with Wilkinson's note. 
 
 * " Records of the Past," vol. iv. pp. 99- 
 103; Wilkinson, "Ancient Egyptians," vol. 
 iv. p. 320. 
 
 t Plat. " Tim." p. 22, A ; Cic. " De Nat. 
 Deor." iii. p. 248. 
 
 J Bunsen, " Egypt's Place," vol. i. p. 386; 
 Wilkinson, " Ancient Egyptians," vol. iv" p. 
 285. 
 
 Birch, " Guide to Museum," p. 13. 
 
 || Birch goes as far as to say, that " most 
 of the gods were connected with the sun, and 
 represented that luminary in its passage 
 through the upper or lower hemisphere " 
 ("Guide," p. n); but this seems to be an 
 exaggeration. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORL1X 
 
 other deities who had a distinctly so- 
 lar character. These were Shu, Aten, 
 Horus or Harmachis, Turn or Atum, 
 Khepra, and Mentu. Shu was the 
 sun's light, Aten the sun's disk, Har, 
 or Har-em-akhu (Horus or Harma- 
 chis), the sun at his rising ; Turn (or 
 Atum) the same luminary at his set- 
 ting ; Khepra was the life-giving power 
 of the sun ; while Mentu was a provin- 
 cial sun-god, adopted into the gener- 
 al pantheon. Athor, moreover, the 
 mother of Ra, and Isis, the sister and 
 wife of Osiris, were in some sort sun- 
 goddesses, and bore upon their heads 
 the disk of Ra, to mark their close 
 connection with the great luminary. 
 
 21. Compared with the worship of 
 the sun, that of the moon was quite 
 secondary and insignificant. Two 
 gods only, Khons and Thoth, had, 
 properly speaking, a lunar character.* 
 Of these Khons was the moon-god 
 simply, while Thoth combined with 
 his lunar aspect, somewhat curiously, 
 the character of " the god of letters." 
 He was represented with the head of 
 an ibis ; and the ibis and cynocepha- 
 lous ape were sacred to him. Both he 
 and Khons commonly bear on their 
 heads a crescent and disk, emblem- 
 atic respectively of the new and the 
 full moon. 
 
 22. Other deities of some impor- 
 tance in the religious system were 
 Maut, the consort of Ammon, who 
 represented matter or nature ; Sati, 
 the consort of Kneph, a sort of Egyp- 
 tian Juno; Sekhet, the consort of 
 Phthah, usually represented as lion- 
 headed, or cat-headed ; Seb, the Egyp- 
 tian Saturn ; Hanhar (Onuris), the 
 Egyptian Mars ; Sabak or Savak, the 
 crocodile-headed god ; Anuke, a war 
 goddess ; Nebta (Nephthys), sister of 
 Osiris and Isis ; Nut or Netpe, god- 
 dess of the firmament ; and Ma, god- 
 dess of truth. The Egyptians had 
 also gods of taste and touch, of silence, 
 of writing, of medicine, of the harvest, 
 etc. Almost any fact of nature, al- 
 
 * Representations of Osiris are found as 
 Osiris- Aah (Birch, " Guide to Museum," p. 
 15), or "Osiris, the moon-god;" but these 
 are pnrelv abnormal. 
 
 most any act of man, might be taken 
 eparately and personified, the personi- 
 fication becoming thenceforth a god 
 or goddess. 
 
 23. A class of deities possessing a 
 very peculiar character remains to be 
 noticed. These are the malevolent 
 deities. Set or Sutech, the great 
 enemy of Osiris, a god with the head 
 of a griffin or giraffe ; Bes, according 
 to some,* the god of death ; Taouris 
 the wife of Bes ; and Apap, or Apepi, 
 the great serpent, generally repre- 
 sented as slain by Horus.t All these 
 were distinctly malignant and evil 
 deities ; their representations were, in 
 every case, more or less hideous and 
 grotesque ; they were all feared and 
 hated, but nevertheless worshiped ; 
 their figures were worn as charms, 
 and even temples were built in their 
 honor. 
 
 24. While the entire pantheon of 
 Egypt was thus multiform and mani- 
 fold, practically the deities who re- 
 ceived worship in each several town 
 and district were but few. Local 
 triads were almost universally recog- 
 nized, and in each place its special 
 triad monopolized, so to say, the relig- 
 ious regards of the inhabitants. $ At 
 Memphis, the established triad con- 
 sisted of Phthah, Sekhet, and Turn ; 
 at Thebes, of Ammon- Ra, Maut, and 
 Khons ; at Heliopolis of Ra, Nebhept 
 (= Athor), and Horus ; at Elephan- 
 tine of Kneph, Sati, and Anuke ; at 
 Abydos, of Osiris, Isis, and Horus ; 
 at Ombos, of Savak, Athor, and 
 Khons ; at Silsilis, of Ra, Phthah, and 
 the Nile god, Hapi or Neilus. Some- 
 times a fourth god or goddess was as- 
 sociated with the principal three, as 
 Bast at Memphis, Neith at Thebes, 
 Nephthys at Abydos, and Hak at Ele- 
 phantine ; but the fourth was always 
 quite subordinate. Occasionally a 
 
 * So Wilkinson ("Ancient Egyptians," 
 vol. iv. p. 431). Others regard Bes as sim- 
 ply a name of Set or Typhon (Birch, " Dic- 
 tionary of Hieroglyphics," p. 581). 
 
 1 Wilkinson, " Ancient Egyptians," " Sup- 
 plement," pi. 42. 
 
 | " Egypt from the Earliest Times," " In- 
 troduction," p. xi. ; Wilkinson, " Ancient 
 Egyptians," vol. iv. pp. 230-233. 
 
8 j86j 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 city recognized more than one triad ; 
 for instance, Silsilis held in honor, 
 besides Ra, Phthah, and Hapi, a triad 
 consisting of Set, Thoth, and Netpe ; 
 and another comprising Ammon, Ra, 
 and Savak. 
 
 25. Another peculiar feature of the 
 Egyptian religion, and one which, 
 though it may have had some redeem- 1 
 ing points,* must be pronounced on 
 the whole low and degrading, was the 
 worship of live animals. In the first 
 instance, certain animals seem to have 
 been assumed as emblems of certain 
 gods,t from some real or fancied 
 analogy ; after which, in course of 
 time, the animals themselves came to 
 be regarded as sacred ; specimens of 
 them were attached to the temples, 
 kept in shrines, and carefully fed and 
 riurtured during life, and at death em- 
 balmed and buried in sacred reposi- 
 tories, while the entire species had a 
 sacred character assigned to it univer- 
 sally or partially. Animals of these 
 kinds it was unlawful to kill, either in 
 Egypt generally, or within the limits 
 within which they were honored; if 
 they died, their death was mourned, 
 and they were carefully buried by 
 those who found them, or to whom 
 they belonged, with more or less cere- ! 
 mony.t Of animals universally sa- j 
 cred the principal were cows and heif- 
 ers, which were sacred to Athor ; cy- 
 nocephalous apes and ibises, which 
 were sacred to Thoth ; cats, which 
 were sacred to Bast ; hawks, which 
 were sacred to Ra ; and perhaps asps, 
 though this is uncertain. Sheep, es- 
 pecially rams, were generally regarded 
 as sacred, being emblems of Kneph : 
 and dogs, though not assigned to any 
 special deity, held a similar position. 
 
 26. The worship of other animals 
 
 * The sacred character of cows and heifers 
 secured a continual increase in the stock of 
 cattle ; that of cats and ichneumons, of ibises, 
 hawks, and vultures, preserved those useful 
 animals, of which the two former kept the 
 houses free from mice and snakes, while the 
 three latter were admirable scavengers. 
 
 t As the vulture of Maut, the ibis of Thoth, 
 and the ram of Kneph, etc. 
 
 | Herod, ii. 66, 67, with*Wilkinson's notes. 
 
 So AVilkinson, "Ancient Egyptians," 
 vol. v. p. ^43. 
 
 had a more local character. Lions, 
 emblems of Horus and Turn, were sa- 
 cred at Leontopolis ; crocodiles, em- 
 blems of Savak, at Crocodilopolis and 
 in the Fayoum generally ; wolves or 
 jackals, emblems of Anubis, at Lyco- 
 polis ; shrew-mice, emblems of Maut, 
 at Buto and Athribis ; hippopotami 
 emblems of Set and Taouris, at Pa- 
 premis ; antelopes at Coptos ; ibexes 
 and frogs at Thebes ; goats at Mendu ; 
 vultres at Eileithyia ; fish at Latopolis ; 
 ichneumons at Heracleopolis ; and 
 pther animals elsewhere. Each town 
 was jealous for the honor of its special 
 favorites ; and quarrels broke out 
 between city and city, or between 
 province and province, in connection 
 with their sacred animals, which led 
 in some cases to violent and prolonged 
 conflicts, in others to a smoldering 
 but permanent hostility. It is diffi- 
 cult to say how much of the religious 
 sentiment of the nation was absorbed 
 by these unworthy objects ; but there 
 is no just ground for believing that 
 the animal worship, absurd as it may 
 have been, interfered seriously with 
 the reverence and respect which were 
 paid to the proper deities. 
 
 27. The worst, and most pronounced 
 form of the animal worship has still 
 to be mentioned. In some instances 
 the belief was, not that a particular 
 class of animals had a sacred charac- 
 ter, but that a deity absolutely became 
 incarnate in an individual animal, 
 and so remained till its death. Ani- 
 mals to which this was supposed to 
 have happened were actual gods, and 
 received the most profound venera- 
 tion that it was possible to pay. 
 Such were the Apis bulls, of which a 
 succession was maintained at Mem- 
 phis, in the temple of Phthah, incarna- 
 tions, according to some, of Phthah,* 
 according to others of Osiris,t which 
 were among the objects of worship 
 most venerated by the Egyptians. 
 Such, again, were the Mnevis bulls 
 of Heliopolis, incarnations of Ra or 
 
 * See Birch, " Egypt from the Earliest 
 Times," " Introduction," p. xii. 
 
 t Wilkinson, in Rawlinson's " Herodotus," 
 vol. ii. p. 428, note 2. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 Turn, and the Bacis or Pacis bulls of I echo with their joyous acclamations. 
 Hermonthis, incarnations of Horus. | The worship was 'concluctecj chiefly 
 
 These beasts, maintained at the cost 
 of the priestly communities in the 
 great temples of their respective cities 
 were perpetually adored and prayed 
 to by thousands during their lives, 
 and at their deaths were entombed 
 with the utmost care in huge sarcoph- 
 agi, while all Egypt went into mourn- 
 ing on account of their decease. 
 
 28. The external manifestation of 
 religion in Egypt was magnificent 
 and splendid. Nowhere did religious 
 ceremonial occupy a larger part in 
 the life of a people. In each city and 
 town, one or more grand structures 
 upreared themselves above the rest 
 of the buildings, enriched with all 
 that Egyptian art could supply of 
 painted and sculptured decoration, 
 dedicated to the honor and bearing 
 the name of some divinity or divinities. 
 The image of the great god of the 
 place occupied the central shrine, ac- 
 companied in most instances by two 
 or three contemplar gods or goddesses. 
 Around were the chambers of the 
 priests, and further off court after 
 court, some pillared, some colonnaded, 
 and all more or less adorned with 
 sculpture and painting, the entrance 
 to them lying through long avenues 
 of sphinxes or obelisks, which con- 
 ducted to the propylaea, two gigantic 
 towers flanking the main doorway.* 
 A perpetual ceremonial of the richest 
 kind went on within the temple walls ; 
 scores of priests, with shaven heads 
 and clean white linen garments,! 
 crowded the courts and corridors ; 
 long processions made their way up 
 or down the sphinx avenues, incense 
 floated in the air, strains of music re- 
 sounded without pause, hundreds of 
 victims were sacrificed ; everywhere 
 a holiday crowd, in bright array, 
 cheerful and happy, bore its part in 
 the festival, and made the courts re- 
 
 * These towers have been compared, with 
 some reason, to those which commonly adorn 
 the western fagade of our cathedrals. (Fer- 
 gusson, " History of Architecture," vol. i. p. 
 
 by means of rhythmic lit^toes 
 hymns, in which prayer an&v 
 
 t Herod, ii. 37. 
 
 were blended, the latter predominat- 
 ing.* Ceremonv followed cerSfoW* " 
 
 ing.* Ceremony followed 
 The calendar was crowded with fes- 
 tivals ; and a week rarely passed with- * 
 out the performance of some special 
 rite, some annual observance, having 
 its own peculiar attractions. Foreign- 
 ers beheld with astonishment the al- 
 most perpetual round of religious ser- 
 vices, which engaged, or at any rate 
 seemed to engage, the main attention 
 of all ranks of the people. 
 
 29. Belief in a future life was a main 
 principle of the Egyptian religion. 
 Immediately after death, the soul, it 
 was taught, descended into the lower 
 world (Amenti), and was conducted 
 to the " Hall of Truth," where it was 
 judged in the presence of Osiris, and 
 of his forty-two assessors, the " Lords 
 of Truth," and judges of the dead. 
 Anubis, the son of Osiris, who was 
 called " the director of the weight," 
 brought forth a pair of scales, and 
 after placing in one scale a figure or 
 emblem of Truth, set in the other 
 a vase containing the good deeds of 
 the deceased, Thoth standing by the 
 while, with a tablet in his hand, 
 whereon to record the result. t If 
 the good deeds were sufficient, if they 
 weighed down the scale wherein they 
 were placed, then the happy soul was 
 permitted to enter " the boat of the 
 sun," and was conducted by good 
 spirits to the Elysian fields (Aahlu), 
 to the " Pools of Peace," and the 
 dwelling-places of the blest. If, on 
 the contrary, the good deeds were 
 insufficient, if the scale remained 
 suspended in the air, then the unhappy 
 soul was sentenced, according to the 
 
 *See the "Litany of Ra," and the 
 " Hymns " to Osiris, Amen, Amen-Ra, and 
 Ra-Harmachis, published in " Records of the 
 Past," vol. ii. pp. 105-134; vol. iv. pp. 99- 
 104; vol. vi. pp. 99-101 ; and vol. viii. pp. 131- 
 
 I34- 
 
 t Wilkinson, " Ancient Egyptians," vol. 
 v. pp. 314, 315. Representations of the 
 scene are frequent in the tombs, and in the 
 many copies of the " Ritual of the Dead." 
 
10 [86] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 degree of its ill deserts, to go through 
 a round of transmigrations in the 
 bodies of animals more or less un- 
 clean ; the number, nature, and dura- 
 tion of the transmigrations depending 
 on the degree of the deceased's demer- 
 its, and the consequent length and se- 
 verity of the punishment which he de- 
 served, or the purification which he 
 needed. Ultimately, if after many 
 trials sufficient purity was not attained, 
 the wicked soul, which had proved it- 
 self incurable, underwent a final sen- 
 tence at the hands of Osiris, judge of 
 the dead, and, being condemned to 
 complete and absolute annihilation, 
 was destroyed upon the steps of 
 Heaven by Shu, the Lord of Light.* 
 The good soul, having first been freed 
 from its infirmities by passing through 
 the basin of purgatorial fire guarded 
 by the four ape-faced genii, was made 
 the companion of Osiris, for a period 
 of three thousand years, after which 
 it returned from Amenti, re-entered 
 its former body, rose from the dead, 
 and lived once more a human life 
 upon the earth. This process was 
 gone through again and again, until 
 a certain mystic cycle of years be- 
 came complete, when, to crown all, 
 the good and blessed attained the 
 final joy of union with God, being 
 absorbed into the divine essence 
 from which they had once emanated, 
 and so attaining the full perfection 
 and true end of their existence. 
 
 30. With their belief in a future 
 life, and their opinions regarding the 
 fate of good and bad souls, were bound 
 up in the closest way their arrange- 
 ments with respect to dead bodies, and 
 their careful and elaborate prepara- 
 tion of tombs. As each man hoped 
 to be among those who would be re- 
 ceived into Aahlu, and after dwelling 
 with Osiris for three thousand years 
 would return to earth, and re-enter 
 their old bodies, it was requisite that 
 bodies should be enabled to resist de- 
 cay for that long period. Hence the 
 entire system of embalming, of swath- 
 ing in linen, and then burying in stone 
 
 * Birch, "Guide to Museum," pp. 14, 15. 
 
 sarcophagi covered with lids that it 
 was scarcely possible to lift, or even 
 to move. Hence if a man was wealthy, 
 tie spent enormous sums on making 
 himself a safe and commodious, an ele- 
 gant and decorated tomb ; either pil- 
 .ng a pyramid over his sarcophagus, or 
 excavating deep into the solid rock, and 
 preparing for his resting-place a remote 
 chamber at the end of a long series of 
 galleries. With the notion, probably, 
 that it would be of use to him in h'is 
 passage through Amenti to Aahlu, he 
 took care to have the most important 
 passages from the sacred book enti- 
 tled the " Ritual of the Dead," either 
 inscribed on the inner part of the coffin 
 in which he was to lie, or painted on 
 his mummy bandages, or engraved 
 upon the inner walls of his tomb.* 
 Sometimes he even had a complete 
 copy of the book buried with him, no 
 doubt for reference, if his memory 
 failed to supply him with the right in- 
 vocation or prayer at the dangerous 
 parts of his long journey. 
 
 31. The thought of death, of judg- 
 ment, of a sentence to happiness or 
 misery according to the life led on 
 earth, was thus familiar to the ordi- 
 nary Egyptian. His theological no- 
 tions were confused and fantastical ; 
 but he had a strong and abiding con- 
 viction that his fate after death would 
 depend on his conduct during his life 
 on earth, and especially on his ob- 
 servance of the moral law and per- 
 formance of his various duties.f 
 
 *Bunsen, "Egypt's Place," vol. v. pp. 127- 
 129. 
 
 t See Birch, "Egypt from the Earliest 
 Times," p. 46 : "The Egyptian enjoyed all 
 the pleasures of existence, and delighted more 
 in the arts of peace than war. In his relig- 
 ious belief the idea of a future state, and prob- 
 ably of the transmigration of souls, was ever 
 present to his mind, while and his long life 
 was one preparation for death to be devoted 
 or pious to the gods, obedient to the wishes 
 of his sovereign, affectionate toward his wife 
 and children, were the maxims inculcated for 
 his domestic or inner life. Beyond that cir- 
 cle his duties to mankind were comprised in 
 giving bread to the hungry, drink to the 
 thirsty, clothes to the naked, oil to the 
 wounded, and burial to the dead. On the ex- 
 ercise of good works he rested his hopes of 
 passing the ordeal of the future and great 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT \Y;:RL1>. 
 
 11 
 
 32. The better educated Egyptian 
 had a firmer grasp of the truths of 
 natural religion. Below the popular 
 mythology there lay concealed from 
 general view, but open to the educated 
 classes, a theological system which 
 was not far removed from pure " nat- 
 ural theology." The real essential 
 unity of the divine nature was taught 
 and insisted on. The sacred texts 
 spoke of a single being, " the sole pro- 
 ducer of all things in heaven and 
 earth, himself not produced of any," 
 " the only true living God, self-origi- 
 nated," " who exists from the begin- 
 ning," " who has made all things, but 
 has not himself been made." * This 
 being seems never to have been rep- 
 resented by any material, even sym- 
 bolical form.f It is thought that he 
 had no name, or, if he had, that it 
 must have been unlawful to pronounce 
 or write it.$ Even Ammon, the " con- 
 cealed God," was a mere external ad- 
 umbration of this mysterious and un- 
 approachable deity. He was a pure 
 spirit, perfect in every respect, all- 
 wise, all-mighty, supremely, perfectly 
 good. 
 
 33. Those who grasped this great 
 truth understood clearly that the many 
 gods of the popular mythology were 
 mere names, personified attributes of 
 the one true Deity, or parts of the nat- 
 ure which he had created, considered 
 as informed and inspired by him. 
 Num or Kneph represented the crea- 
 tive mind Phthah the creative hand, 
 or act of creating ; Maut represented 
 matter, Ra the sun, Khons the moon, 
 Seb the earth, Khem the generative 
 power in nature, Keith the conceptive 
 power, Nut the upper hemisphere of 
 heaven, Athor the lower world or un- 
 der hemisphere ; Thoth personified 
 
 judgment, and reaching the Aahlu or Elysian 
 fields, and Pools of Peace of the Egyptian 
 paradise." 
 
 * Lenormant, " Manuel d'Histoire An- 
 cienne," vol. i. p. 522. Similar phrases are 
 frequent in all the religious inscriptions. 
 (See " Records of the Past," vol. ii. pp. 129- 
 132; vol. iv. pp. 99-100; vol. vi. 100, etc.))' 
 
 t Wilkinson, " Ancient Egyptians," vol. iv. 
 p. 178. 
 Ibid. 
 
 the divine wisdom, Ammon the divine 
 mysteriousness or incomprehensibility, 
 Osiris the divine goodness. It may 
 not be always easy to say what is the 
 exact quality, act, or part of nature 
 which is represented by each god and 
 goddess ; but the principle was clear 
 and beyond a doubt. No educated 
 Egyptian priest certainly, probably no 
 educated layman, conceived of the 
 popular gods as really separate and 
 distinct beings. All knew that there 
 was but one god, and understood that 
 when worship was offered to Khem, 
 or Phthah, or Maut, or Thoth, or Am- 
 mon, the one god was worshiped un- 
 der some one of his forms, or in some 
 one of his aspects. Hence, in the sol- 
 emn hymns and chants, which were 
 composed by the priests to be used in 
 the various festivals, the god who is 
 for the time addressed receives all the 
 highest titles of honor, and even has 
 the names of other gods freely assigned 
 to him, as being in some sort identical 
 with them. Thus in one hymn, Hapi, 
 the Nile god, is invoked as Ammon 
 and Phthah;* in another, Osiris as 
 Ra and Thoth ; f while in a third Ra 
 is Khem and Ammon, Turn and Horus 
 and Khepra all in one,$ and though 
 spoken of as " begotten of Phthah," 
 is "the good god," "the chief of all 
 the gods," " the ancient of heaven," 
 " the lord of all existences," the sup- 
 port of all things." |j 
 
 34. It is not altogether easy to say 
 what the educated Egyptian believed 
 with respect to evil. The myth of 
 Osiris represented him as persecuted 
 by his brother, Set or Sutech, who 
 murdered him and cut up his body 
 into several pieces, after which he 
 was made war upon by Horus, Osiris' 
 son, and in course of time deposed 
 and thrust down to darkness.lT In 
 the latter mythology Set and Bes, 
 Taouris and Apepi were distinctly 
 
 * " Records of the Past," vol. iv. p. 107, 11- 
 4 and n. 
 
 t Ibid. p. 103, par. 24, ad fin. 
 
 \ Ibid. vol. h. pp. 130, 131, and 133. 
 
 Ibid. p. 129, 1. 20. 
 
 I! Ibid. 11. 2-12. 
 
 IT Wilkinson, " Ancient Egyptians," vol. ir. 
 PP- 3 2 9-333- 
 
- [901 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 malignant beings, personifications, 
 apparently, of an evil principle ; and 
 from the inscriptions and papyri of 
 this period, we should gather that 
 the Egyptian religion was dualist ic, 
 and comprised the idea of a constant 
 and interminable struggle between 
 the powers of light and darkness, 
 of good and evil ; a struggle in which 
 there was some superiority on the 
 part of good, but no complete victory, 
 not even a very decided preponder- 
 ance. On the other hand, as we go 
 back and examine carefully the more 
 ancient monuments and the earlier 
 writings, we find less and less trace 
 of this antagonism; we find Set or 
 Sutech spoken of as "great," "glo- 
 rious ; ?> * we find that the kings iden- 
 tify themselves with him,f build him 
 magnificent temples, and make him 
 numerous offerings. $ It is doubtful 
 whether at this time any notion existed 
 of evil or malignancy attaching to Set. 
 If it did, we must suppose the early 
 creed to have been that "the bad 
 was a necessary part of the universal 
 system, and inherent in all things 
 equally with the good ; " and so, 
 that divine honors were due to the 
 gods representing the principles of 
 disorder and evil no less than to those 
 representing the opposite principles. 
 The change of view with regard to 
 Set may have been connected to some 
 extent with national rivalries, for Set 
 was, beyond a doubt, the special god 
 of the Hyksos,|| the foreign con- 
 querors of Egypt, whom after-ages 
 detested, and also of the Khita or 
 Hittites,1[ with whom the Pharaohs of 
 the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twen- 
 tieth dynasties were engaged in con- 
 stant hostilities. 
 
 35. It has been maintained by 
 
 * " Records of the Past," vol. iv. p. 29. 
 
 t Ibid. vol. ii. p. 76; vol. viii. p. 75. 
 
 \ Ibid. vol. iv. p. 27 ; vol. viii. pp. 27-31. 
 
 So Wilkinson, " Ancient Egyptians," vol. 
 iv. p. 423. 
 
 II Birch, "Egypt from the Earliest Times," 
 p. 75; "Records of the Past," vol. viii. p. 
 
 ' . V Records of the Past," vol. iv. pp. 31, 32. 
 
 some that the religion of the educated 
 Egyptians comprised a recognition 
 of the doctrine of the Trinity. The 
 learned Cudworth in the seventeenth 
 century undertook to prove that a 
 doctrine closely resembling the Chris- 
 tian had been taught by the Egyptian 
 priests many centuries before Christ,* 
 and some moderns have caught at his 
 statements, and laid it down that the 
 doctrine of the Trinity maybe traced 
 to an Egyptian source. But there is 
 really not the slightest ground for 
 this assertion. Cudworth's argu- 
 ments were long ago met and refuted 
 by Mosheim ; f and modern investiga- 
 tion of the Egyptian remains has but 
 confirmed Mosheim's conclusions. 
 The Egyptians held the unity of God ; 
 but their unity had within it no trinity. 
 God with them was absolutely one in 
 essence, and when divided up, was 
 divided, not into three, but into a 
 multitude of aspects. It is true that 
 they had a fancy for triads ; but a 
 triad is not a Trinity. The triads are 
 not groups of persons, but of attrib- 
 utes ; the three are not coequal, but 
 distinctly the reverse, the third in the 
 triad being always subordinate ; nor 
 is the division regarded as in any case 
 exhaustive of the divine nature, or ex- 
 clusive of other divisions. Moreover, 
 as already observed, the triad is fre- 
 quently enlarged by the addition of a 
 fourth person or character, who is 
 associated as closely with the other 
 three as they are -with each other. 
 Cudworth's view must therefore be 
 set aside as altogether imaginary ; 
 and the encomiast of the Egyptian 
 religion must content himself with 
 pointing out that a real monotheism 
 underlay the superficial polytheism, 
 without requiring us to believe that 
 even the wisest of the priests had any 
 knowledge of the greatest of all Chris- 
 tian mysteries, t 
 
 * See the " Intellectual System of the Uni- 
 verse, 1 ' ch. v. p. 413. 
 
 t In the Latin translation of Cudworth's 
 great work, notes to p. 413. 
 
 \ See Latin translation of Cudworth's great 
 work, p. 28. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 191] 13- 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE RELIGION OF THE ASSYRIANS 
 AND BABYLONIANS. 
 
 " Bel boweth down, Nebo stoopeth." 
 ISAIAH xlvi. i. 
 " Merodach is broken in pieces." JER. 1. 2. 
 
 36. THE Babylonian and Assyrian 
 polytheism differed from the Egyp- 
 tian, in the first place, by being less 
 multitudinous,* and in the second, 
 by having far more than the Egyp- 
 tian, an astral character. The Meso- 
 potamian system was, moreover, so 
 far as appears, what the Egyptian was 
 not, a belief in really distinct gods. 
 The great personages of the pantheon 
 have for the most part their own pe- 
 culiar offices and attributes ; they do 
 not pass the one into the other ; they 
 clo not assume each other's names ; 
 they do not combine so as to produce 
 a single deity out of several. We 
 have no indication in the literary re- 
 mains of Babylon or Assyria of any 
 esoteric religion, no evidence on which 
 we can lay it down that the concep- 
 tions of the educated upon religious 
 subjects differed seriously from those 
 of the lowest ranks of worshipers.f 
 Berosus, who was a Chaldaean priest, 
 and who should, therefore, if there 
 was any such system, have been 
 well acquainted with it, has in his ex- 
 tant fragments nothing monotheistic, 
 nothing to distinguish his religious 
 views from those of the mass of his 
 countrymen. According to all ap- 
 pearance, the religion of the Baby- 
 lonians and Assyrians was thus a real 
 polytheism, a worship of numerous 
 divinities, whom it was not thought 
 necessary to trace to a single stock,! 
 
 * It is true that the inscriptions speak in a 
 vague way of " four thousand," and even of 
 the " five thousand gods " (" Records of the 
 Past," vol. vii. p. 128 ; Rawlinson, "Ancient 
 Monarchies," vol. i. p. 155, note 9). But, 
 practically, there are not more than about 
 twenty deities who obtain frequent mention. 
 
 t The late Mr. Fox Talbot expressed in 
 1873 a somewhat different opinion. (See the 
 "Transactions of the Society of Biblical 
 Archaeology," vol. ii. p. 35.) But it does not 
 appear to me that he made out his case. 
 
 $ See the Author's " Ancient Monarchies," 
 vol. i. p. 142. 
 
 who were essentially on a par the one 
 with the other, and who divided among 
 them the religious regards of the peo- 
 ple. 
 
 37. An account of the Assyrian and 
 Babylonian religion must thus be, in 
 the main, an account of their pantheon. 
 From the character of their gods, 
 from the actions and attributes as- 
 signed to them, from the material 
 representations under which they 
 showed them forth, we must gather 
 the tone of their religious thought, 
 the nature of the opinions which they 
 entertained concerning the mysterious 
 powers above them and beyond them, 
 whom they recognized as divine be- 
 ings. 
 
 38. In each country, at the head of 
 the pantheon stood a god, not the 
 origin of the others, nor in any real 
 sense the fountain of divinity, but of 
 higher rank and dignity than the rest 
 primus inter pares, ordinarily named 
 first, and assigned the titles of great- 
 est honor, and forming the principal 
 or at least the highest object of wor- 
 ship both to the kings and people. 
 This deity is, in Assyria, Asshur ; in 
 Babylonia, II or Ra. Some critics * 
 are of opinion that the two gods are 
 essentially one, that the Assyrian As- 
 shur is neither more nor less than II 
 or Ra localized and regarded as the 
 special god of Assyria, the protector 
 of the Assyrian territory and the tute- 
 lary divinity of the Assyrian kings. 
 But this view is not generally accepted 
 and seems to rest upon no sure foun- 
 dation. There is a marked difference 
 of character and position between the 
 Babylonian II and the Assyrian As- 
 shur. II in the Babylonian system is 
 dim and shadowy ; his attributes are, 
 comparatively speaking, indistinct ; 
 and his very name is not of frequent 
 occurrence. f Asshur in the Assyr- 
 ian system is, of all the gods, by far 
 
 *As M. Lenormant. (See his "Manuel 
 d'Histoire Ancienne," vol. ii. p. 182.) 
 
 t In the six Assyrian volumes of " Records 
 of the Past," I find the name of II (or El), 
 only four times (vol. v. pp. 21, 129; vol. vii. 
 pp. 95, 96). In two of these places it seems 
 to stand for Bel, who is called Bel-El some- 
 times (Ibid, vol. xi. p. 24). 
 
14 [92] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 the most pronounced and prominent 
 figure. No name occurs so often as 
 his ; no god has attributes so clear- 
 ly marked and positive. On these 
 grounds it has been generally held, 
 that the two are not to be identified, 
 but to be kept distinct, and to be re- 
 garded as respectively peculiar to the 
 two nations. We proceed, therefore, 
 to speak of them separately. 
 
 39. II (or Ra) was, as already re- 
 marked, a somewhat shadowy being. 
 There is a vagueness about the name 
 itself, which means simply " god," 
 and can scarcely be said to connote 
 any particular attribute. The Baby- 
 lonians never represent his form, and 
 they frequently omit him from lists 
 which seem to contain all the other 
 principal gods.* Yet he was cer- 
 tainly regarded as the head of the 
 pantheon, and in the most ancient 
 times must have been acknowledged 
 as the tutelary deity of Babylon itself, 
 which received its name of Bab-il (in 
 Accadian, Ka-ra\ meaning " the Gate 
 of II," from him. He seems to have 
 had no special temple, being probably 
 worshiped in all temples by the few 
 persons who were his votaries. His 
 name was, occasionally, but not very 
 frequently, used as an element in 
 the personal appellations of Babylo- 
 nians, f 
 
 40. Asshur, the Assyrian substitute 
 for II or Ra, was primarily and espe- 
 cially the tutelary deity of Assyria and 
 of the Assyrian monarchs. The land 
 of Assyria bears his name without 
 any modification ; its inhabitants are 
 i; his servants "or "his people;" its 
 troops " the armies of the god As- 
 shur ; " its enemies " the enemies of 
 Asshur." As for the kings, they stand 
 connected with him in respect of al- 
 most everything which they do He 
 places them upon the throne, firmly 
 
 * As, for instance, that of Agu-kak-rimi in 
 the inscription published in vol. vii. of the 
 " Records," pp. 7, 8, where ten " great gods" 
 are enumerated, viz. : Anu and Anunit, Bel 
 and Beltis, Hea and Davjdna, ZSra (Zir-ba 
 nit ? ), Sin, Shamas, and Merodach, but no 
 mention is made of II. 
 
 t " Records of the Past," vol.iii. p. 15 ; vol. 
 ix. p. 99 ; etc. 
 
 establishes them in the government, 
 lengthens the years of their reigns, 
 preserves their power, protects their 
 Forts and armies, directs their expe- 
 ditions, gives them victory on the day 
 of battle, makes their name cele- 
 brated, multiplies their offspring 
 greatly, and the like. To him they 
 look for the fulfillment of all then- 
 wishes, and especially for the estab- 
 lishment of their sons, and their sons' 
 sons, on the Assyrian throne to the 
 remotest ages. Their usual phrase 
 when speaking of him is, " Asshur, 
 my lord." They represent themselves 
 as passing their lives in his service. 
 It is to spread his worship that they 
 carry on their wars. They fight, rav- 
 age, destroy in his name. Finally, 
 when they subdue a country, they are 
 careful to " set up the emblems of 
 Asshur," and to make the conquered 
 people conform to his laws.* 
 
 41. The ordinary titles of Asshur 
 are, " the great lord," " the king of 
 all the gods," " he who rules supreme 
 over the gods." He is also called, 
 occasionally, " the father of the gods," 
 although that is a title which belongs 
 more properly to Bel. He is figured 
 as a man with a horned cap, and 
 often carrying a bow, issuing from the 
 middle of a winged circle, and either 
 shooting an arrow, or stretching forth 
 his hand, as if to aid or smite. The 
 winged circle by itself is also used as 
 his emblem, and probably denotes his 
 ubiquity and eternity, as the human 
 form does his intelligence, and the 
 horned cap his power. This emblem, 
 with or without the human figure, is 
 an almost invariable accompaniment 
 of Assyrian royalty. The great king 
 wears it embroidered upon his robes, 
 carries it engraved upon his seal or 
 cylinder, represents it above his head 
 in the rock-tablets whereon he carves 
 his image, stands or kneels in ador- 
 ation before it, fights under its 
 shadow, under its protection returns 
 victorious, places it conspicuously up- 
 on his obelisks. And in all these 
 
 * "Records of the Past," vol. i. p. 17; 
 vol. iii. pp. 86, 93, 95, 96; vol. v. pp. 14, 15, 
 etc. ; vol. ix. pp. 5, 8, 9, etc. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 representations, it is remarkable how 
 he makes the emblem conform to the 
 circumstances in which he is himself 
 engaged at the time. Where he is 
 fighting, Asshur, too, has his arrow 
 upon the string, and points it against 
 the monarch's adversaries. When he 
 is returning home victorious, With the 
 disused bow in his left hand, and his 
 right hand outstretched and elevated, 
 Asshur, too, has the same attitude. 
 In peaceful scenes the bow disappears 
 altogether. If the king worships, the 
 god holds out his hand to aid ; if he 
 is engaged in secular acts, the Divine 
 presence is thought to be sufficiently 
 marked by the circle and the wings 
 without the human figure.* 
 
 42. In immediate succession to 
 Asshur in Assyria and II in Babylonia, 
 we find in both countries a triad, con- 
 sisting of Anu, Bel, and Hea or Hoa. 
 These three are called, par excellence, 
 " the great gods." f In execrations 
 they are separated off from all the 
 other deities, and placed together in 
 a clause which stands at the head of 
 the list of curses. In invocations 
 their names follow, for the most part, 
 immediately after the name of As- 
 shur; and this is their usual and 
 proper position in all complete lists 
 of the chief gods. $ Anu and Bel in 
 the Babylonian system are brothers, 
 both being sons of II or Ra ; but this 
 relationship is scarcely acknowledged 
 in Assyria. Hoa in both countries 
 stands apart, unconnected with the 
 other two, and, indeed, unconnected 
 with any of the other gods, except 
 with such as are his offspring. 
 
 43. It has been conjectured that 
 in this triad we have a cosmogonic 
 myth, and that the three deities rep- 
 resent Anu, the primordial chaos, or 
 matter without form ; Hoa, life and 
 intelligence, considered as moving in 
 
 * See the Author's " Ancient Monarchies," 
 Yol. ii. pp. 234, 235. 
 
 " Records of the Past," vol. vii. p. 121 ; 
 vol. ix. pp. 100, 106, etc. 
 
 \ " Records of the Past," vol. Hi. p. 83 ; 
 vol. v. p. 29 ; vol. vii. p. 7 ; vol. ix. p. 23, etc. 
 
 See Lenormant, " Manuel d'Histoire 
 Ancienne," vol. ii. pp. 182, 183. 
 
 and animating matter ; and Bel, the 
 organizing and creating spirit, by 
 which matter was actually brought 
 into subjection, and the material uni- 
 verse arranged in an orderly way. 
 But it may be questioned whether the 
 veil which hides the esoteric meaning 
 of the Assyrian religion has been as 
 yet sufficiently lifted to entitle such 
 conjectures to much attention. Our 
 own belief is that Anu, Bel, and Hoa 
 were originally the gods of the earth, 
 of the heaven, and of the waters, thus 
 corresponding in the main to the 
 classical Pluto, Zeus or Jupiter, and 
 Poseidon or Neptune, who divided 
 between them the dominion over the 
 visible creation. But such notions 
 became, in course of time, overlaid to 
 a great extent with others ; and 
 though Hoa continued always more or 
 less of a water deity, Anu and Bel 
 ceased to have peculiar spheres, and 
 became merely "great gods," with a 
 general superintendence over the 
 world, and with no very marked differ- 
 ence of powers. 
 
 44. Anu is commonly spoken of as 
 "the old Ann," "the original chief," 
 " the king of the lower world," and 
 "the lord of spirits and demons." 
 There is one text in which he seems 
 to be called " the father of the gods," 
 but the reading is doubtful. We 
 cannot identify as his any of the di- 
 vine forms on the Assyrian or Baby- 
 lonian monuments, nor can we assign 
 to him any emblem, excepting that 
 of the single upright wedge, which 
 represents him on the Chaldaean 
 numeration tablets. This single 
 wedge has the numerical power of 
 sixty, and sixty appears to have been 
 assigned to Anu as his special number. 
 Though a "great god," he was not 
 one toward whom much preference 
 was shown. His name is scarcely 
 ever found as an element in royal or 
 other appellations ; the kings do not 
 very often mention him ; and only 
 one monarch speaks of himself as his 
 special votary.* 
 
 * Tiglath Pileser I. (See " Records of the 
 Past," vol. v. p. 24.) Yet even he is still 
 more devoted to Asshur. 
 
1G 104] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 45. The god Bel, familiarly known 
 to us both from Scripture * and from 
 the Apocrypha,! is one of the most 
 marked and striking figures in the 
 pantheon alike of Babylonia and of 
 Assyria. Bel is " the god of lords," 
 " the father of the gods," " the crea- 
 tor," "the mighty prince," and "the 
 just prince of the gods." He plays a 
 leading part in the mythological le- 
 gends, which form so curious a feat- 
 ure in the Babylonian and Assyrian 
 religion. In the " History of Crea- 
 tion " we are told that Bel made the 
 earth and the heaven ; that he formed 
 man by means of a mixture of his 
 own blood with earth, and also 
 formed beasts ; and that afterward he 
 created the sun and the moon, the 
 stars, and the five planets. $ In the 
 " War of the Gods," we find him con- 
 tending with the great dragon, Tia- 
 mat, and after a terrible single com- 
 bat destroying her by flinging a 
 thunderbolt into her open mouth. 
 He also, in conjunction with Hoa, 
 plans the defense when the seven 
 spirits of evil rise in rebellion, and 
 the dwelling-place of the gods is 
 assaulted by them.|| The titles of 
 Bel generally express dominion. He 
 is "the lord," par excellence, which is 
 the exact meaning of his name in 
 Assyrian ; he is " the king of all the 
 spirits," " the lord of the world," and 
 again, " the lord of all the countries," 
 Babylon and Nineveh are, both of 
 them, under his special care ; Nine- 
 veh having the title of " the city of 
 Bel," in some passages of the inscrip- 
 tions. The chief seat of the worship 
 of Bel in Babylonia was Nipur, now 
 Niffer, and in Assyria, Calah, now 
 Niinrud. He had also a temple at 
 Duraba (Akkerkuf). 
 
 46. Hea or Hoa, the third god of 
 the first triad, ranks immediately after 
 Bel in the complete lists of Assyrian 
 deities. He is emphatically one of 
 
 * Isaiah xlvi. I ; Jer. 1. 2 ; li. 44. 
 t See the history of " Bel and the Dragon." 
 } Berosus ap. Euseb. <r Chron. Can." i. 3. 
 "Records of the Past," vol. ix. pp. 137- 
 
 139- 
 
 j| Ibid. vol. v. p. 164. 
 
 the "great gods," and is called, "the 
 king," " the great inventor," and " the 
 determiner of destinies." We have 
 already remarked that he was specially 
 connected with the element of water 
 and hence he is " the king of the deep,'' 
 " the king of rivers," " the lord of fount- 
 ains," and, to a certain extent, " the 
 lord of the harvest." In the legend 
 of creation he is joined with Bel, in 
 the office of guardian, and watches 
 over the regularity of the planetary 
 courses.* In the "War of the Gods/' 
 he and Bel plan the defense, after 
 which Hea commits the executions of 
 the plans made to his son, Marduk or 
 Merodach.t In the flood legend, Hea 
 naturally plays an important part. It 
 is he who announces to Hasis-adra, 
 the Babylonian Noah, that a deluge is 
 about to destroy mankind, and com- 
 mands him to build a great ship, in 
 order that he may escape it.$ It is 
 he again who opposes the wish of Bel 
 to make the destruction complete, and 
 persuades him to let Hasis-adra and 
 his family come out safe from the ark. 
 In the tale of Ishtar's descent into 
 Hades, Hea's counsel is sought by the 
 moon-god ; and by a skillful device he 
 obtains the restoration of the Queen 
 of Love to the upper world. || Indeed, 
 throughout the whole of the mythology 
 we find all clever inventions and well- 
 laid plans ascribed to him, so that his 
 history quite justifies his title of " lord 
 of deep thoughts." Hea is probably 
 intended by the Oe of Helladius,^! 
 and the Cannes of Berosus,** who 
 came up out of the Persian Gulf, and in- 
 structed the first settlers on the Lower 
 Tigris and Euphrates in letters, science, 
 religion, law, and agriculture. 
 
 47. In direct succession to the three 
 gods of the first triad, Anu, Bel, and 
 Hea or Hoa, we find a second still 
 more wide]y recognized triad, com- 
 prising the moon-god, the sun-god, and 
 the god of the atmosphere. There is 
 
 * " Records of the Past," vol. ix. p. 118. 
 t Ibid. vol. v. p. 165. 
 \ Ibid. vol. vii. pp. 135, 136. 
 Ibid. p. 142. 
 || Ibid. vol. i. pp. 147-149. 
 l"Ap. Phot. " Bibliothec." cclxxxix. p. 1594. 
 ** Berosus ap. Euseb. " Chron. Can." 1. s. c. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT \VOKLD. 
 
 IU5J 17 
 
 great difference of opinion with respect j 
 to the name of the last god of these 
 three, which is never spelt phonetically 
 in the inscriptions, but only repre- 
 sented by a monogram. He has been 
 called Iva (or Yav), Vul, Bin, Yem 
 (or Im), and recently Rimmon.* 
 Without presuming to decide this 
 vexed question, we propose to adopt 
 provisionally the rendering "Vul," as 
 the one likely to be most familiar to 
 our readers, from its employment by 
 Sir Henry Rawlinson, Mr. George 
 Smith, and Mr. Fox Talbot. We shall 
 speak therefore of the second triad as 
 one consisting of Sin, Shamas, and j 
 Vul, the gods respectively of the moon, 
 the sun, and the atmosphere. 
 
 48. It ' is very noticeable that in 
 Assyria and Babylonia the moon-god 
 took precedence of the sun-god. 
 Night probably was more agreeable to 
 the inhabitants of those hot regions 
 than day ; and the cool, placid time 
 when they could freely contemplate 
 the heavens, and make their stellar 
 and other observations, was especially 
 grateful to the priestly astronomers 
 who had the superintendence and ar- 
 rangement of the religion. Sin, the 
 moon, is thus one of the leading deities. 
 He is called, " the chief of the gods 
 of heaven and earth," " the king of 
 the gods," and even " the god of the 
 gods." t These seem, however, to 
 be hyperbolical expressions, used by 
 his votaries in the warmth of their 
 hears, when in the stage of religion 
 which Professor Max Miiller has desig- 
 nated " Henotheism." $ Sin more 
 properly was " the brilliant," " the 
 illuminator," " he who dwells in the 
 sacred heavens," "he who circles 
 round the heavens," and " the lord of 
 the month." Again, for some recon- 
 dite reason, which is not explained, he 
 was selected to preside over architect- 
 ure, and in this connection he is " the 
 
 * " Transactions of the Society of Biblical 
 Archaeology," vol. v. p. 441 ; " Records of the 
 past," vol. v. p. 29; vol. vii. pp. 165, 170; 
 vol. ix. pp. 23, 27, etc. 
 
 t In the Inscription of Nabonidus. (See 
 "Records of the Past," vol. v. pp. 146, 147.) 
 
 J " Contemporary Review," Nov. 1878, pp. 
 722. 
 
 supporting architect," "the strength- 
 ener of fortifications," and, more gen- 
 erally, " the lord of building." 
 
 49. A close bond of sympathy united 
 Sin with the two other members of the 
 second triad. When the seven spirits 
 of evil made war in heaven, and di- 
 rected their main attack upon Sin, as 
 the chief leader of the angelic host, 
 Shamas and Vul instantly came to 
 his aid, withstood the spirits, and, 
 fighting firmly side by side with him, 
 succeeded in repulsing them.* The 
 three are frequently conjoined in in- 
 vocations, execrations, and the like.f 
 In offerings' and festivals, however, 
 Sin is united with Shamas only, the 
 place of Vul being taken by a goddess 
 who is entitled " the divine mistress of 
 the world." t 
 
 50. Sin was among the gods most 
 widely and devoutly worshiped, both 
 in Babylonia and Assyria. He had 
 temples at Ur, Babylon, Borsippa, 
 Calah, and Dur-Sargina. The third 
 month of the year, called Sivan, was 
 dedicated to him. In a month not 
 so dedicated we find sacrifice to the 
 moon prescribed on nine days out of 
 the thirty. His name was widely 
 used as an element in royal and other 
 appellations, as, for instance, in the 
 well-known name, Sennacherib, which 
 in the original is Sin-akhi-irib, or 
 " Sin has multiplied brothers." 
 
 51. Shamas, the sun-god, occupies 
 the middle position in the second 
 triad, which is either " Sin, Shamas, 
 Vul," or "Vul, Shamas, Sin," though 
 more commonly the former. His 
 titles are either general or special. 
 In a general way he is called, " the 
 establisher of heaven and earth," " the 
 judge of heaven and earth," "the 
 warrior of the world," and " the regent 
 of all things," while, with direct refer- 
 
 *See "Records of the Past," vol. v. pp. 
 164-166. 
 
 t Ibid. vol. i. pp. 57, 93, etc. ; vol. v. pp. 
 7, 122, 123 ; vol. ix. pp. 23, 100, etc. 
 
 \ " Records of the Past," vol. vii. pp. 159, 
 162, etc. 
 
 See the calendar referred to in the _last 
 note, where sacrifices to Sin are prescribed 
 for the ist, 2d, I3th,' I4th, iSth, 2oth, 2ist, 
 22d, and 29th days of the month. 
 
IS 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 ence to bis physical nature, he is " the 
 lord of fire," " the light of the gods," 
 "the ruler of the day," and "he who 
 illumines the expanse of heaven and 
 earth." 
 
 52. The kings regard him as afford- 
 ing them especial help in war. He 
 is " the supreme ruler, who casts a 
 favorable eye on expeditions," the 
 " vanquisher of the king's enemies," 
 " the breaker-up of opposition." He 
 "casts his motive influence " over the 
 monarchs, and causes them to " as- 
 semble their chariots and their war- 
 riors," he " goes forth with their 
 armies," and enables them to extend 
 their dominions ; he chases their ene- 
 mies before them, causes opposition 
 to cease, and brings them back with 
 victory to their own country. 
 
 53. Besides this, in time of peace, 
 he helps them to sway the scepter of 
 power, and to rule over their subjects 
 with authority. It seems that, from 
 observing the manifest agency of the 
 material sun in stimulating all the 
 functions of nature, the Assyrians and 
 Babylonians came to the conclusion 
 that the sun-god exerted a similar in- 
 fluence over the minds of men, and 
 was the great motive agent in human 
 history.* 
 
 54. The worship of Sham as wr.s 
 universal. The seventh month, Tisri, 
 was dedicated to him, and in the 
 second Elul, he had, like the moon- 
 god, nine festivals. His emblem ap- 
 pears upon almost all the religious 
 cylinders, and in almost all lists of 
 the gods his name holds a high place. 
 Sometimes he is a member of a lead- 
 ing triad, composed of himself to- 
 gether with Sin and Asshur. t In the 
 mythological legends he is not very 
 frequently mentioned. We find him, 
 however, defending the moon-god, in 
 conjunction with Vul, when the seven 
 spirits make their assault upon 
 heaven ; $ and in the deluge tablets 
 
 *" Ancient Monarchies," vol. i. p. 160= 
 t This is the position which he holds regu- 
 larly in the Inscriptions of Asshurbanipal, 
 the son of Esarhaddon. .(See " Records of 
 the Past," vol. i. pp. 58, 71, 77, 93-5, 99, 100, 
 103, etc.). 
 t See above, p. 16. 
 
 we are told that it was he who actual- 
 ly made the Flood.* But otherwise 
 the mythology is silent about him, 
 offering in this respect a remarkable 
 contrast to the Egyptian, where the 
 sun is the principal figure. 
 
 55. Vul, the god of the atmosphere, 
 who completes the second triad, has, 
 on the whole, a position quite equal 
 to that of Sin and Shamas, whom he 
 occasionally even precedes in the 
 ists.f Some kings seem to place 
 aim on a par with Anu, or with 
 Asshur, recognizing Anu and Vul, or 
 Asshur and Vul, as especially " the 
 great gods," and as their own pecul- 
 iar guardians. $ In a general way 
 be corresponds with the " Jupiter 
 Tonans " of the Romans, being the 
 " prince of the power of the air," Ihe 
 lord of the whirlwind and the tem- 
 pest, and the wielder of the thun- 
 derbolt. His most common titles 
 are " the minister of heaven and 
 earth," " the lord of the air," and 
 "he who makes the tempest to 
 
 ige." He is regarded as the de- 
 stroyer of crops, the rooter-up of trees, 
 the scatterer of the harvest ; famine, 
 scarcity, and even their consequence, 
 pestilence, are assigned to him. He 
 is'said to have in his hand a " flaming 
 sword," with which he effects his rav- 
 ages; and this "flaming sword," 
 which probably represents lightning, 
 seems to form his emblem on the tab- 
 lets and cylinders, where it is figured 
 as a double or triple bolt. But Vul 
 has also a softer character; as the 
 god of the atmosphere he gives the 
 rain ; and hence he is " the careful 
 and beneficent chief," "the giver 
 of abundance," and "the lord of 
 fecundity." In this capacity, he is 
 naturally chosen to preside over ca- 
 nals, the great fertilizers in Mesopo- 
 tamia ; and thus we find among his 
 titles, " the lord of canals," and " the 
 establisher of works of irrigation." 
 56. To the eight "great gods," 
 
 *" Records of the Past," vol. vii. p. 138. 
 t Ibid. vol. ix. p. 100. 
 t Ibid. vol. iii. p. 46 ; vol. v. pp. 24-26. 
 " Ancient Monarchies," voL i. pp. 164, 
 165. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 whose functions have been here de- 
 scribed, may be added most conven- 
 iently in this place, six goddesses. It 
 was a general, though not a universal 
 rule, in the Assyrian and Babylonian 
 mythology, that each god should 
 have a wife. From this law the heads 
 of the respective pantheons, II and 
 Asshur, were exempt;* but otherwise 
 almost all the principal deities are 
 united in pairs, one of whom is male 
 and the other female. Anu has a wife, 
 Anata or Anat, who is a pale and 
 shadowy personage, the mere faint re- 
 flex of her husband whose name she 
 receives, merely modified by a femi- 
 nine inflection. Bil or Bel has a wife, 
 Bilat, known to the classical writers 
 as Beltis or Mylitta,f a term stand- 
 ing to Bil as Anat to Anu, but desig- 
 nating a far more substantial being. 
 Beltis is " the mother of the gods," 
 " the great goddess," " the great 
 lady," *' the queen of the lands," and 
 " the queen of fecundity." She cor- 
 responds to the Cybele of the Phry- 
 gians, the Rhea of the Greeks, and 
 the " Magna Mater " or " Bona Dea " 
 of the Romans. Occasionally, she 
 adds to this character the attributes of 
 Bellona and even Diana, being spoken 
 of as presiding over war and hunting. 
 The wife of Hoa has been called 
 Dav-kina ; but the first element of the 
 name seems now to be read more 
 generally as Nin, while the second 
 is rendered by azu.%. Ninazu is said 
 to have been "queen of Hades " and 
 " the lady of the house of Death." 
 Her special office was to watch and 
 soothe the last hours of the dying. || 
 
 *In one place I observe a mention of 
 a "goddess Assuritu " (" Records," vol. i. p. 
 60), who might seem to be a feminine form 
 of Asshur. But the original reads, " Asshur 
 va Ishtar Assuritu," which shows Aseuritu 
 to be a mere title of Ishtar. (See G. Smith's 
 " Annals of Asshurbanipal," p. 17.) 
 
 t Herod, i. 131, 199; Hesychius ad. voc. 
 
 \ " Records of the Past," vol. ix. pp. 131, 
 132. Professor Sayce reads the name as 
 Ninkigal (Ibid. p. 146). 
 
 See Professor Sayce's note on the pas- 
 sage last quoted. 
 
 J 4 Records," vol. v. p. 146. Compare vol. 
 iii. p. 141. 
 
 To the wife of Sin no proper name is 
 given ; but she is frequently asso- 
 ciated with her husband under the ap- 
 pellation of " the great lady." The 
 wife of Shamas is Gula or Anunit, who 
 was, Ifke Beltis, a "great goddess," 
 but had a less distinctive character, 
 being little more than a female Sun. 
 Finally, Vul had a wife called Shala 
 or Tula, whose common title is sarrat, 
 " Queen," but who is a colorless and 
 insignificant personage. 
 
 57. On the second of the two great 
 triads which hold so high a place in 
 the Assyrian and Babylonian panthe- 
 ons, there follows a group of five gods, 
 with an unmistakably astral charac- 
 ter. These are Nin or Bar, Merodach 
 or Marduk, Nergal, Ishtar, and Nebo, 
 who correspond respectively to the 
 planets, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Venus, 
 and Mercury. Nin, or Bar, who pre- 
 sided over the most distant of the vis- 
 ible planets, Saturn, was more an 
 object of worship in Assyria than in 
 Babylonia. He has been called " the 
 Assyrian Hercules,"* and in many 
 respects resembles that hero of the 
 classical nations. Among his titles 
 are found, "the lord of the brave," 
 " the warlike," " the champion," " the 
 warrior who subdues foes," " the re- 
 ducer of the disobedient," " the exter- 
 minator of rebels," "the powerful 
 I lord," " the exceeding strong god," 
 and " he whose sword is good." He 
 presides in a great measure both over 
 war and hunting. Most of the Assyr- 
 ian monarchs represent themselves 
 as going out to war under- his aus- 
 pices, and ascribe their successes 
 mainly to his interposition. He is 
 especially useful to them in the sub- 
 jection of rebels. He also on some 
 occasions incites them to engage in 
 the chase, and aids them strenuously 
 in their encounters with wild bulls and 
 lions.f It is thought that he was em- 
 blematically portrayed in the winged 
 and human-headed bull, which forms 
 
 * Layard, "Nineveh and Babylon," p. 214; 
 " Records of the Past," vol. v. pp. 7, 21, 23, 
 etc. 
 
 t See " Records of the Past," vol. v. p. 21. 
 
L>0 [98] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 so striking a feature in the architect- 
 ural erections of the Assyrians. 
 
 58. As Nin was a favorite Assyrian 
 so Merodach was a favorite Babylo- 
 nian god. From the earliest times the 
 Babylonian monarchs placed him in 
 the highest rank of deities, worship- 
 ing him in conjunction with Anu, 
 Bel, and Hea, the three gods of the 
 first triad.* The great temple of 
 Babylon, known to the Greeks as the 
 Temple of Bel,t was certainly dedi- 
 cated to him ; and it would therefore 
 seem that the later Babylonians, at 
 any rate, must have habitually applied 
 to him the name of Bel, or " lord,'' 
 which in earlier times had designated 
 a different member of their pantheon. 
 Merodach's ordinary titles are, " the 
 great," "the great lord," "the 
 prince," " the prince of the gods," 
 and " the august god." He is also 
 called, " the judge," " the most an- 
 cient," "he who judges the gods," 
 "the eldest son of heaven," and in 
 one place, "the lord of battles."! 
 Occasionally, he has still higher and 
 seemingly exclusive designations, such 
 as, "the great lord of eternity," "the 
 king of heaven and earth," " the lord 
 of all beings," " the chief of the gods," 
 and " the god of gods."^ But these 
 titles seem not to be meant exclu- 
 sively. He is held in considerable 
 honor among the Assyrians, being 
 often coupled with Asshur,|| or with 
 Asshur and Nebo,H as a war-god, one 
 by whom the kings gain victories, and 
 obtain the destruction of their ene- 
 mies. But it is in Babylonia, and es- 
 pecially in the later Babylonian Em- 
 pire under Nebuchadnezzar and Ne- 
 riglissar, that his worship culminates. 
 It is then that all the epithets of high- 
 est honor are accumulated upon him, 
 
 * See the Inscription of Agu-kak-rimi, pub- 
 lished in the " Records of the Past," vol. vii. 
 p. 3, lines 5 and 6. 
 
 t Herod, i. 181-183; Strab. xvi. p. 1049; 
 Arrian, " Exp. Alex." vii. 17. 
 
 J " Records of the Past," vol. v. p. 29. 
 
 Ibid. vol. v. pp. 112, 119, 122 ; vol. ix. pp. 
 96, 1 06. 
 
 || Ibid. vol. i. p. 20 ; vol. iii. pp. 53, 55 ; vol. 
 v. p. 41 ; vol. x. p. 53, etc. 
 
 *{Ibtd. vol. vii. pp. 25, 27, 45, etc. 
 
 and that he becomes an almost ex- 
 clusive object of worship ; it is then 
 that we find such expressions as : "I 
 supplicated the king of gods, the lord 
 of lords, in Borsippa, the city of his 
 loftiness,"* and "O god Merodach, 
 great lord, lord of the house of the 
 gods, light of the gods, father, even 
 for thy high honor, which changeth 
 not, a temple have I built."t 
 
 59. In his stellar character, Mero- 
 dach represented the planet Jupiter, 
 with which he was supposed to have 
 a very intimate connection. The 
 eighth month (Marchesvan) was ded- 
 icated to him.$ In the second Elul 
 he had three festivals on the third, 
 on the seventh, and on the sixteenth 
 day. 
 
 60. Nergal, who presided over the 
 planet Mars, was essentially a war- 
 god. His name signifies " the great 
 man," or the "great hero; "|| and his 
 commonest titles are " the mighty 
 hero," " the king of battle," " the de- 
 stroyer," " the champion of the gods," 
 and " the great brother." He " goes 
 before " the kings in their warlike ex- 
 peditions, and helps them to con- 
 found and destroy their enemies. 
 Nor is he above lending them his 
 assistance when they indulge in the 
 pleasures of the chase. One of his 
 titles is " the god of hunting," *![ and 
 while originally subordinated to Nin 
 in this relation, ultimately he outstrips 
 his rival, and becomes the especial 
 patron of hunters and sportsmen. 
 Asshur-bani-pal, who is conspicuous 
 among the Assyrian kings for his in- 
 tense love of field sports, uniformly 
 ascribes his successes to Nergal, and 
 does not even join with him any other 
 deity. Nergal's emblem was the hu- 
 man-headed and winged lion, which 
 is usually seen, as it were on guard, 
 at the entrance of the royal palaces. 
 
 * " Records of the Past," vol. v. p. 120. 
 
 t Ibid. p. 142. 
 
 J Ibid. vol. vii. p. 169. 
 
 Ibid. pp. 159, 1 60 and i 
 
 || Sir Rawlmson in the Author's " Herodo- 
 tus," vol. i. p. 655. 
 
 T Sir H. Rawlinson in the Author's " He- 
 rodotus," 1. s. c. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 61. Ishtar, who was called Nanaby 
 the Babylonians,* corresponded both 
 in name and attributes with the As- 
 tarte' of the Phoenicians and Syrians. 
 Like the Greek Aphrodite* and the 
 Latin Venus, she was the Queen of 
 Love and Beauty, the goddess who 
 presided over the loves both of men 
 and animals, and whose own -amours 
 were notorious. In one of the Izdu- 
 bar legends, she courts that romantic 
 individual, who, however, declines her 
 advances, reminding her that her 
 favor had always proved fatal to those 
 persons on whom she had previously 
 bestowed her affections.f There can 
 be little doubt that in Babylon, at any 
 rate, she was worshiped with unchaste 
 rites, $ and that her cult was thus 
 of a corrupting and debasing charac- 
 ter. But besides and beyond this soft 
 and sensual aspect, Ishtar had a fur- 
 ther and nobler one. She corre- 
 sponded, not to Venus only, but also 
 to Bellona ; being called " the god- 
 dess of war and battle," " the queen 
 of victory," " she who arranges bat- 
 tles," and " she who defends from at- 
 tack." The Assyrian kings very gen- 
 erally unite her with Asshur, in the 
 accounts which they give of their ex- 
 peditions ; speaking of their forces 
 as those which Asshur and Ishtar had 
 committed to their charge ; of their 
 battles as fought in the service of 
 Asshur and Ishtar, and of their tri- 
 umphs as the result of Asshur and 
 Ishtar exalting them above their ene- 
 mies. Ishtar had also some general 
 titles of a lofty but vague character ; 
 she was called, "the fortunate," "the 
 happy," "the great goddess," "the 
 mistress of heaven and earth," and 
 " the queen of all the gods and god- 
 desses." In her stellar aspect, she 
 presided ox'er the planet Venus ; and 
 
 * " Records of the Past," vol. iii. pp. 7, 10, 
 n, 13, 14, etc. ; vol. v. pp. 72, 83, 102, etc. 
 
 " Records of the Past," vol. ix. pp. 125- 
 128. 
 
 J See Herod, i. 199 ; of Baruch, vi. 43, and 
 Strabo, xvi. p. 1058. 
 
 " Records of the Past." vol. i. pp. 69-86 ; 
 vol. iii. p. 45, etc. 
 
 the sixth month, Elul, was dedicated 
 to her* 
 
 62. Nebo, the last of the five plane- 
 tary deities, presided over Mercury. 
 It was his special function to have 
 under his charge learning and knowl- 
 edge. He is called " the god who 
 possesses intelligence,"! " he who 
 hears from afar," " he who teaches," 
 and " he who teaches and instructs,"^ 
 The tablets of the royal library at 
 Nineveh are said to contain " the wis- 
 dom of Nebo." He is also like 
 Mercury, " the minister of the gods," 
 though scarcely their messenger, an 
 office which belongs to Paku. At the 
 same time, as has often been re- 
 marked, || Nebo has, like many olher 
 of the Assyrian and Babylonian 
 gods, a number of general titles, im- 
 plying divine power, which, if they 
 had belonged to him alone, would 
 have seemed to prove him the supreme 
 deity. He is " the lord of lords, who 
 has no equal in power," " the supreme 
 chief," "the sustainer," "the sup- 
 porter," " the ever ready," " the. guard- 
 ian of heaven and earth," " the lord 
 of the constellations," " the holder of 
 the scepter of power," "he who grants 
 to kings the scepter of royalty for the 
 governance of their people." It is 
 chiefly by his omission from many 
 lists, and by his humble place,1T when 
 he is mentioned together with the 
 really " great gods," that we are as- 
 sured of his occupying a (compara- 
 tively speaking) low position in the 
 general pantheon. The planetary 
 gods had in most instances a female 
 complement. Nebo was closely asso- 
 ciated with a goddess called Urmit or 
 Tasmit, Nergai with one called Laz, 
 and Merodach with Zirpanit or Zir- 
 
 * " Records of the Past," vol. vii. p. 169. 
 
 t Ibid. vol. v. pp. 113, 122, etc. 
 
 \ " Ancient Monarchies," vol. i. p. 177. 
 
 " Records of the Past," vol. i. p. 58. 
 
 || Sir H. Rawlinson in the Authors " He- 
 rodotus," vol. i. p. 661 ; " Ancient Monarch- 
 ies," 1. s. c. 
 
 If Nebo's place varies commonly from the 
 
 fifth to the thirteenth, and is generally about 
 
 the seventh. Nebuchadnezzar, however, puts 
 
 him third. (" Records of the Past," vol. v. p. 
 
 i 122.) 
 
[i03j 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 banit. Nin, the son of Bel and Beltis, 
 is sometimes made the husband of his 
 mother,* but otherwise has no fe- 
 male counterpart. Ishtar is some- 
 times coupled with Nebo in a way 
 that might suggest her being his \vife,t 
 if it were not that that position is cer- 
 tainly occupied by Urmit. 
 
 63. Among other Assyrian and 
 Babylonian deities may be mentioned 
 Nusku, a god assigned a high rank by 
 Asshur-bani-pal ;$ Makhir, the gocl- 
 dess of dreams, Paku, the divine 
 messenger, || Laguda, the god of a 
 town call Kisikjf Zamal, Turda, Ish- 
 kara, Malik, deities invoked in 
 curses ;** Zicum, a primeval goddess, 
 said to be " the mother of Ann ; and 
 the gocls,''tt Dakan,$$ perhaps Da- 
 gon, Martu, Zira, Idak, Kurrikh, etc. 
 Many other strange names also oc- 
 cur, but either rarely, or in a con- 
 nection which is thought to indicate 
 that they are local appellations of 
 some of th well-known deities. No 
 more need be said of these person- 
 ages, since the general character of 
 the religion is but little affected by 
 the oelief in gods who played so very 
 insignificant a part in the system. 
 
 64. The Assyrians and Babylonians 
 worshiped their gods in shrines or 
 chapels of no very great size, to which, 
 however, was frequently attached a 
 lofty tower, built in stages, which were 
 sometimes as many as seven. The 
 tower could be ascended by steps on 
 the outside, and was usually crowned 
 by a small chapel. The gods were 
 represented by images, which were 
 either of stone or metal, and which 
 bore the human form, excepting in 
 two instances. Nin and Nergal were 
 portrayed, as the Jews, perhaps, por- 
 
 * Ancient Monarchies," vol. i. p. 169. 
 
 ^ Ibid. vol. i. p. 176. 
 
 J " Records of the Past," vol. i. pp. 57, 58. 
 
 7 J 77, 94, 95. etc - 5 vo1 - ix - PP- 45. 61, etc. 
 
 Ibid. vol. ix. p. 152. 
 
 || Ibid. vol. v. p. 165. 
 
 IF Ibid. vol. ix. pp. 3 and 15. 
 ; * Ibid. p. 101. 
 
 ft Ibid. p. 146, and note. 
 
 \\ Ibid. vol. lii. p. 40; voj. v. p. 117 ; vol 
 vii. pp. n, 27, etc. 
 
 As at Borsippa (Birs-i-Nimrod), where a 
 portion of each stage remains. 
 
 trayed their cherubim, by animal forms 
 of great size and grandeur, having 
 luman heads and huge outstretched 
 wings.* There was nothing hideous 
 or even grotesque about the represen- 
 ations of the Assyrian gods. The 
 object aimed at was to fill ihe specta- 
 or with feelings of awe and rever- 
 ence ; and the figures have, in fact, 
 universally, an appearance of calm 
 placid strength and majesty, which is 
 most solemn and impressive. 
 
 65. The gods were worshiped, as 
 generally in the ancient world, by 
 prayer, praise, and sacrifice. Prayer 
 was offered both for oneself and for 
 others. The " sinfulness of sin " was 
 deeply felt, and the Divine anger dep- 
 recated with much earnestness. " O! 
 my Lord,' ? says one suppliant, "my 
 sins are many, my trespasses are great; 
 and the wrath of the gods has plagued 
 me with disease, and sickness, and 
 sorrow. I fainted, but no one 
 stretched forth his hand ; I groaned, 
 but no one drew nigh. I cried aloud, 
 but no one heard. O Lord, do not 
 Thou abandon thy servant. In the 
 waters of the great storm, do Thou 
 lay hold of his hand. The sins which 
 he has committed, do Thou turn to 
 righteousness. "t Special interces- 
 sion was made for the Assyrian kings. 
 The gods were besought to grant 
 them " length of days, a strong sword, 
 extended years of glory, pre-eminence 
 among monarchs, and an enlarge- 
 ment of the bounds of their empire." \ 
 It is thought that their happiness in 
 a future state was also prayed for. 
 Praise was even more frequent than 
 prayer. The gods were addressed 
 under their various titles, and their 
 benefits to mankind commemorated. 
 "O Fire!" we read on one tablet, U 
 " Great Lord, who art exalted above 
 all the earth ! O ! noble son of 
 heaven, exalted above all the earth, 
 
 * tfzek. x. 8-22. 
 
 t " Records of the Past," vol. iii. p. 136. 
 
 I Ibid. p. 133. 
 
 Fox Talbot in the "Transactions of the 
 Society of Biblical Archaeology," vol. i. p. 
 107. 
 
 H "Records of the Past," vol. iii. pp. 137, 
 138- 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [I01J 23 
 
 O Fire, with thy bright flame, thou 
 dost produce light in the dark house ! 
 Of all things that can be named, thou 
 dost create the fabric; of bronze and 
 of lead, thou art the melter ; of silver 
 and of gold, thou art the refiner ; of 
 . . . thou art the purifier. Of the 
 wicked man, in the night-time, thou 
 dost repel the assault ; but the man 
 who serves his God, thou wilt give 
 him light for his actions." Sacrifice 
 almost always accompanied prayer 
 and praise. Every day in the year 
 seems to have been sacred to some 
 deity or deities, and some sacrifice or 
 other was offered every day by the 
 monarch,* who thus set an example to 
 his subjects, which we may be sure 
 they were not slow to follow. The 
 principal sacrificial animals were bulls, 
 oxen, sheep, and gazelles.f Libations 
 of wine were also a part of the recog- 
 nized worship, | and offerings might 
 be made of anything valuable. 
 
 66. It is an interesting question 
 how far the Assyrians and Babylo- 
 nians entertained any confident expec- 
 tation of a future life, arid, if so, what 
 view they took of if. That the idea 
 did not occupy a prominent place in 
 their minds ; that there was a con- 
 trast in this respect between them and 
 the people of Egypt, is palpable from 
 the very small number of passages in 
 which anything like an allusion to a 
 future state of existence has been 
 delected. Still, there certainly seem 
 to be places in which the continued 
 existence of the dead is spoken of, 
 and where the happiness of the good 
 and the wretchedness of the wicked 
 in the future state are indicated. It 
 has been already noticed, that in one 
 passage the happiness of the king in 
 another world seems to be prayed for. 
 In two or three others, prayer is 
 offered for a departing soul in terms 
 like the following : " May the sun 
 
 * See the fragment of a Calendar pub- 
 lished in the " Records of the Past," vol. vii. 
 pp. 159-168. 
 
 t Ibid, pp. 137, 159, and 161 ; "Ancient 
 Monarchies," vol. ii. p. 271. 
 
 | " Records of the Past," vol. iii. p. 124; 
 vol. vii. p. 140. 
 
 give him life, and Merodach grant 
 him an abode of happiness,"* or, " To 
 the sun, the greatest of the gods, may 
 he ascend ; and may the sun, the 
 greatest of the gods, receive his soul 
 into his holy hands."f The nature of 
 the happiness enjoyed may be gathered 
 from occasional notices, where the 
 soul is represented as clad in a white 
 radiant garment,* as dwelling in the 
 presence of the gods, and as partak- 
 ing of celestial food in the abode of 
 blessedness. On the other hand, 
 Hades, the receptacle of the wicked 
 after death, is spoken of as "the 
 abode of darkness and famine," the 
 place '* where earth is men's food, and 
 their nourishment clay; where light 
 is not seen, but in darkness they 
 dwell; where ghosts, like birds, flutter 
 their wings, and on the door and the 
 doorposts the dust lies undisturbed."! 
 Different degrees of sinfulness seem 
 to meet with different and appropriate 
 punishments. There is one place 
 apparently,- a penal fire reserved for 
 unfaithful wives and husbands, and 
 for youths who have dishonored their 
 bodies. Thus it would appear that 
 M. Lenormant was mistaken when he 
 said, that, though the Assyrians rec- 
 ognized a place of departed spirits, 
 yet it v/as one " in which there was no 
 trace of a distinction of rewards and 
 punishments." || 
 
 67. The superstitions of the Assyr- 
 ians and Babylonians were numerous 
 and strange. They believed in charms 
 of various kinds ; IT in omens,** in as- 
 trology, in spells, and in a miraculous 
 power inherent in an object which 
 they called " the Mamit." What the 
 
 * " Transactions of the Society of Biblical 
 Archreology," vol. ii. p. 32. 
 
 t Ibid. p. 31. 
 
 \ " Records of the Past," vol. iii. p. 135. 
 
 "Transactions," etc., vol. i. p. 113. 
 
 || " Records of the Past," vol. i. p. 143. 
 
 "If Ibid. vol. iii. p. 142. 
 
 ** Among the remains of Assyrian and 
 Babylonian literature are tables of omens de- 
 rived from dreams, from births, from an in- 
 spection of the hand, or of the entrails of an- 
 imals, and from the objects a traveler meets 
 with on his journey. Dogs alone furnish 
 eighteen omens (Ibid.> vol. v. pp. 160-170). 
 
24 [102 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 Mamit was is quite uncertain.* Ac- 
 cording to the native belief, it had 
 descended from heaven, and was a 
 " treasure," a " priceless jewel," in- 
 finitely more valuable than anything 
 else upon the earth. It was ordina- 
 rily kept in a temple, but was some- 
 times brought to the bedside of a sick 
 person, with the object of driving out 
 the evil spirits to whom his disease 
 was owing, and of so recovering him. 
 68. Among the sacred legends of the 
 Babylonians and Assyrians the follow- 
 ing were the most remarkable. They 
 believed that at a remote date, before 
 the creation of the world, there had 
 been war in heaven. Seven spirits, 
 created by Anu to be his messengers, 
 took counsel together and resolved to 
 revolt. " Against high heaven, the 
 dwelling-place of Anu the king, they 
 plotted evil," and unexpectedly made 
 a fierce attack. The moon, the sun, 
 and Vul, the god of the atmosphere, 
 withstood them, and after a fearful 
 struggle beat them off.f .There was 
 then peace for awhile. But once 
 more, at a later date, a fresh revolt 
 broke out. The hosts of heaven were 
 assembled together, in number five 
 thousand, and were engaged in sing- 
 ing a psalm of praise to Anu, when 
 suddenly discord arose. " With a 
 loud cry of contempt " a portion of 
 the angelic choir " broke up the holy 
 song," uttering wicked blasphemies, 
 and so " spoiling, confusing, confound- 
 ing the hymn of praise." Asshur was 
 asked to put himself at their head, 
 but " refused to go forth with them."! 
 Their leader, who is unnamed, took 
 the form of a dragon, and in that 
 shape contended with the god Bel, 
 who proved victorious in the combat, 
 and slew his adversary by means of a 
 thunderbolt, which he flung into the 
 creature's open mouth. Upon this, 
 the entire host of the wicked angels 
 took to flight, and was driven to the 
 
 * See a paper by Mr. Fox Talbot in the 
 " Transactions of the Society of Biblical 
 Archaeology," vol. ii. pp. 35-42. 
 
 t " Records of the Past," vol. v. pp. 163-166. 
 
 t Ibid. vol. vii. pp. 127, 128. 
 
 Ibid. vol. ix. pp. 137-139. 
 
 abode of the seven spirits of evil, 
 where they were forced to remain, 
 their return to heaven being prohib- 
 ited. In their room man was created.* 
 
 69. The Chaldasan legend of crea- 
 tion, according to Berosus, was as 
 follows : 
 
 " In the beginning all was darkness 
 and water, and therein were generated 
 monstrous animals of strange and pe- 
 culiar forms. There were men with 
 two wings, and some even with four, 
 and with two faces ; and others with 
 two heads, a man's and a woman's, on 
 one body ; and there were men with the 
 heads and horns of goats, and men with 
 hoofs like horses ; and some with the 
 upper parts of a man joined to the 
 lower parts of a horse, like centaurs ; 
 and there were bulls with human 
 heads, dogs with four bodies, and 
 with fishes' tails ; men and horses with 
 dogs' heads ; creatures with the heads 
 and bodies of horses, but with the 
 tails of fish ; and other animals mix- 
 ing the forms of various beasts. 
 Moreover, there were monstrous fishes 
 and reptiles and serpents, and divers 
 other creatures, which had borrowed 
 something from each other's shapes, 
 of all which the likenesses are still 
 preserved in the temple of Belus. A 
 woman ruled them all, by name Omor- 
 ka, which is in Chaldee Thalath, and 
 in Greek Thalassa (or 'the sea'). 
 Then Belus appeared, and split the 
 woman in twain ; and of the one half 
 of her he made the heaven, and of 
 the other half the earth ; and the 
 beasts that were in her he caused to 
 perish. And he split the darkness, 
 and divided the heaven and the earth 
 asunder, and put the world in order, 
 and the animals that could not bear 
 the light perished. Belus, upon this, 
 seeing that the earth was desolate, yet 
 teeming with productive powers, com- 
 manded one of the gods to cut off his 
 head, and to mix the blood which 
 flowed forth with earth, and form men 
 therewith and beasts that could bear 
 the light. So man was made, and was 
 intelligent, being a partaker of the 
 
 * "Records of the Past," vol. vii. p. 177. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 wwtoe 
 
 Divine wisdom. Likewise Belus made 
 the stars, and the sun and the moon, 
 and the five planets."* 
 
 70. The only native account which 
 has been discovered in part resembles 
 this, but in many respects is different. 
 So far as at present deciphered, it runs 
 thus : 
 
 "When the upper region was not 
 yet called heaven, and the lower re- 
 gion was not yet called earth, and the 
 abyss of Hades had not yet opened 
 
 its 
 
 arms, then 
 re birth to 
 
 the chaos of waters 
 all ; and the waters 
 were gathered into one place. Men 
 dwelt not as yet together ; no animals 
 as yet wandered about; nor as yet 
 had the gods been born ; not as yet 
 had tlieir names been uttered, or their 
 attributes [fixed]. Then were born 
 the gods Lakhmu and Lakhamu; 
 they were born and grew up . . . . 
 Asshur and Kisshur were born and 
 lived through many days .... Anu 
 
 (was born next). 
 
 ***** 
 
 " He (Anu ?) constructed dwellings 
 for the great gods ; he fixed the con- 
 stellations, whose figures were like 
 animals. He made the year into por- 
 tions ;. he divided it; twelve months 
 he established, with their constel- 
 lations, three by three. And from 
 among the days of the year he ap- 
 pointed festivals ; he made dwellings 
 for the planets, for their rising and 
 for their setting. And, that nothing 
 should go wrong, nor come to a stand, 
 he placed along with them the dwel- 
 lings of Bel and Hea ; and he opened 
 great gates on all sides, making strong 
 the portals on the left and on the 
 right. Moreover, in the center he 
 placed luminaries. The moon he set 
 on high to circle through the night, 
 and made it wander all the night 
 until the dawning of the day. Each 
 month without fail it brought together 
 festal assemblies ; in the beginning of 
 the month, at the rising of the night, 
 shooting forth its horns to illuminate 
 the heavens, and on the seventh day 
 a holy day appointing, and com man d- 
 
 * Berosus ap. Euseb. " Chron. Can." 
 JSyncell. " Chronographia," vol. i. p. 53. 
 
 i. 2: 
 
 \from all 
 
 
 ng on that day a cessatio 
 3usiness. And he (Anu) set the sun 
 in his place in the horizon of 
 heaven." * 
 
 The following is the 
 account of the Deluge, as rendered 
 from the original by the late Mr. 
 George Smith : t 
 
 spake to me and said : 
 Ubaratutu, make a ship 
 
 tr* 
 Chaldean 
 
 "Hea 
 Son of 
 
 after this fashion 
 the sinners and life 
 
 for I destroy 
 . and cause 
 
 to enter in all the seed of life, that 
 thou mayest preserve them. The 
 ship which thou shalt make, .... 
 cubits shall be the measure of the 
 length thereof, and .... cubits the 
 measure of the breadth and height 
 thereof ; and into the deep thou shalt 
 launch it.' I understood, and said to 
 Hea, my Lord * Hea, my Lord, this 
 which Thou commandest me, I will 
 perform : [though I be derided] both 
 by young and old, it shall be done/ 
 Hea opened his mouth, and spake 
 ' This shalt thou say to them .... 
 (hiatus of six lines) .... and enter 
 thou into the ship, and shut to the 
 door ; and bring into the midst of it 
 thy grain, and thy furniture, and thy 
 goods, thy wealth, thy servants, thy 
 female slaves and thy young men. 
 And I will gather to thee the beasts 
 of the field, and the animals, and I 
 will bring them to thee ; and they shall 
 be enclosed within thy door.' Hasi- 
 sadra his mouth opened and spake, 
 and said to Hea, his Lord * There 
 was not upon the earth a man who 
 could make the ship .... strong 
 [planks] I brought .... on the fifth 
 day .... in its circuit fourteen 
 measures [it measured] ; in its sides 
 fourteen measures it measured .... 
 and upon it I placed its roof and 
 closed [the door]. On the sixth day I 
 embarked in it : on the seventh I ex- 
 
 * " Records of the Past," vol. ix. pp. 117- 
 118. 
 
 t Mr. Smith's paper, read on Dec. 3, 1872, 
 was first published in the " Transactions of 
 the Society of Biblical Archaeology," in 1874. 
 It was afterward revised, and republished in 
 the " Records of the Past," vol. xii. pp. 135- 
 141. The translation is taken mainly from 
 this second version. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 amined it without : on the eighth I 
 examined it within ; planks against 
 the influx of the waters I placed : 
 where I saw rents and holes, I added 
 what was required. Three measures 
 of bitumen I poured over the outside : 
 three measures of bitumen I poured 
 over the inside .... (five lines ob- 
 scure and mutilated) .... Wine 
 in receptacles I collected, like the 
 waters of a river ; also [food], like the 
 dust of the earth, I collected in boxes 
 [and stored up]. And Shamas the 
 material of the ship completed [and 
 made it] strong. And the reed oars 
 of the ship I caused them to bring 
 
 [and place] above and below 
 
 All I possessed of silver, all I pos- 
 sessed of gold, all I possessed of the 
 seed of life, I caused to ascend into 
 the ship. All my male servants, all my 
 female servants, all the beasts of the 
 field, all the animals, all the sons of 
 the people, I caused to go up. A 
 flood Shamas made, and thus he spake 
 in the night : * I will cause it to rain 
 from heaven heavily. Enter into the 
 midst of the ship, and shut thy 
 door.' " 
 
 72. The command of Shamas is 
 obeyed, and then "The raging of a 
 storm in the morning arose, from the 
 horizon of heaven extending far and 
 wide. Vul in the midst of it 
 thundered : Nebo and Saru went in 
 front : the throne-bearers sped over 
 mountains and plains : the destroyer, 
 Nergal, overturned : Ninip went in 
 front and cast down : the spirits 
 spread abroad destruction : in their 
 fury they swept the earth : the flood 
 of Vul reached to heaven. The 
 bright earth to a waste was turned : 
 the storm o'er its surface swept : 
 from the face of the earth was life 
 destroyed : the strong flood that had 
 whelmed mankind reached to heaven : 
 brother saw not brother; the flood 
 did not spare the people. Even in 
 heaven the gods feared the tempest, 
 and sought refuge in the abode of 
 Anu. Like dogs the gods crouched 
 down, and cowered together. Spake 
 Ishtar, like a child uttered the great 
 goddess her speech : ' When the 
 
 world to corruption turned, then I in 
 the presence of the gods prophesied 
 evil. When I in the presence of the 
 gods prophesied evil, then to evil 
 were devoted all my children. I, the 
 mother, have given birth to my peo- 
 ple, and lo ! now like the young of 
 fishes they fill the sea.' The gods 
 were weeping for the spirits with her ; 
 the gods in their seats were sitting in 
 lamentation ; covered were their lips 
 on account of the coming evil. Six 
 days and nights passed ; the wind, the 
 flood, the storm overwhelmed. On 
 the seventh day, in its course was 
 calmed the storm ; and all the tem- 
 pest, which had destroyed like an 
 earthquake, was quieted. The flood 
 He caused to dry ; the wind and the 
 deluge ended. I beheld the tossing 
 of the sea, and mankind all turned 
 to corruption ; like reeds the corpses 
 floated. I opened the window, and 
 the light broke over my face. It 
 passed. I sat down and wept , over 
 my face flowed my tears. I saw the 
 shore at the edge of the sea ; for twelve 
 measures the land rose. To the 
 country of Nizir went the ship: the 
 mountain of Nizir stopped the ship : 
 to pass over it was not able.- The 
 first clay and the second clay the 
 mountain of Nizir, the same ; the 
 third day and the fourth day the 
 mountain of Nizir, the same ; the f.fih 
 and sixth the mountain of Nizir, the 
 same; in the course of the seventh 
 day i sent out a dove, and it left. 
 The dove went to and fro, and a 
 resting-place it did not find, and it 
 returned. I sent forth a swallow, and 
 it left; the swallow went to and fro, 
 and a resting-place it did not find, and 
 it returned. 1 sent forth a raven, and 
 it left ; the raven went, and the 
 corpses on the water it saw, and it 
 did eat : it swam, and wandered away, 
 and returned not. I sent the animals 
 forth to the four winds : I poured out 
 a libation: I built an altar on the 
 peak of the mountain : seven jugs of 
 wine I took; at the bottom I placed 
 reeds, pines, and spices. The gods 
 collected to the burning : the gods col- 
 lected to the good burning. Like 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [105] 
 
 sumpe (?) over the sacrifice they gath- 
 ered.' " 
 
 73. One more example must con- 
 clude our specimens of the legends 
 current among the Assyrians and 
 Babylonians in ancient times. As the 
 preceding passage is myth based upon 
 history, the concluding one shall be 
 taken from that portion of Assyrian 
 lore which is purely and wholly imag- 
 inative. The descent of Ishtar to 
 Hades, perhaps in search of Tammuz, 
 is related as follows * : 
 
 "To the land of Hades, the land 
 of her desire, Ishtar, daughter of the 
 Moon-good Sin, turned her mind. 
 The daughter of Sin fixed her mind to 
 go to the House where all meet, the 
 dwelling of the god Iskalla, to the 
 house which men enter, but cannot 
 depart from the road which men 
 travel, but never retrace the abode 
 of darkness and of famine, where 
 earth is their food, their nourishment 
 clay where light is not seen, but in 
 darkness they dwell where ghosts, 
 like birds, flutter their wings, and on 
 the door and the door-posts the dust 
 lies undisturbed. 
 
 u When Ishtar arrived at the gate 
 of Hades, to the keeper of the gate a 
 word she spake : ' O keeper of the 
 entrance, open thy gate ! Open thy 
 gate, I say again,that I may enter in ! 
 If thou openest not thy gate, if I do 
 not enter in, I will assault the door, 
 the gate I will break down, I will at- 
 tack the entrance, I will split open 
 the portals. I will raise the dead, to 
 be the devourers of the living ! Upon 
 the living the dead shall prey.' Then 
 the porter opened his mouth and spake, 
 and thus he said to great Ishtar: 
 * Stay, lady, do not shake down the 
 door; I will go and inform Queen 
 Nin-ki-gal.' So the porter went in 
 and to Nin-ki-gal said : * These curses 
 thy sister Ishtar utters; yea, she 
 blasphemes thee with fearful curses.' 
 And Nin-ki-gal, hearing the words, 
 
 *The translation of Mr. Fox Talbot, as 
 given in the " Transactions of the Society of 
 Biblical Archaeology," vol. Hi. pp. 119-124, 
 and again in " Records of the Past," vol. i! 
 pp. 143-149, is here followed. 
 
 grew pale, like a flower when cut from 
 the stem ; like the stalk of a reed, she 
 shook. And she said, ' I will cure 
 her rage I will speedily cure her 
 fury. Her curses I will repay. Light 
 up consuming flames ! Light up a 
 blaze of straw ! Be her doom with 
 the husbands who left their wives ; 
 be her doom with the wives who for- 
 sook their lords ; be her doom with 
 the youths of dishonored lives. Go, 
 porter, and cpen the gate for her ; but 
 strip her, as some have been stripped 
 ere now.' Tne porter went and opened 
 the gate. 'Lady of Tiggaba, enter,' 
 he said : * Enter. It is permitted. 
 The Queen of Hades to meet thee 
 comes.' So the first gate let her in, 
 but she was stopped, and there the 
 great crown was taken from her head. 
 ' Keeper, do not take off from me the 
 crown that is on my head.' * Excuse 
 it, lady, the Queen of the Land insists 
 upon its removal.' The next gate let 
 her in, but she was stopped, and there 
 the ear-rings were taken from her 
 ears. * Keeper, do not take off from 
 me the ear-rings from my ears.' * Ex- 
 cuse it, lady, the Queen of the Land 
 insists upon their removal.' The 
 third gate let her in, but she was 
 stopped, and there the precious stones 
 were taken from her head. * Keeper, 
 do not take off from me the gems that 
 adorn my head.' Excuse it, lady, 
 the Queen of the Land insists upon 
 their removal.' The fourth gate let 
 her in, but she was stopped, and there 
 the small jewels were taken from her 
 brow. ' Keeper do not take off from 
 me the small jewels that deck my 
 brow.' ' Excuse it, lady, the Queen 
 of the Land insists .upon their re- 
 moval.' The fifth gate let her in, but 
 she was stopped, and there the girdle 
 was taken from her waist. ' Keeper, 
 do not take off from me the girdle 
 that girds my waist.' * Excuse it, 
 lady, the Queen of the Land insists 
 upon its removal.' The sixth gate 
 let her in, but she was stopped, and 
 there the gold rings were taken from 
 her hands and feet. * Keeper, do not 
 take off from me the gold rings of my 
 hands and feet.' * Excuse it, lady, 
 
[106] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 the Queen of the Land insists upon 
 their removal.' The seventh gate let 
 her in, but she was stopped, and there 
 the last garment was taken from her 
 body. 'Keeper, do not take off, I 
 pray, the last garment from my body.' 
 'Excuse it, lady, the Queen of the 
 Land insists upon its removal.' 
 
 " After that Mother Ishtar had de- 
 scended into Hades, Nin-ki-gal saw 
 and derided her to her face. Then 
 ishtar lost her reason, and heaped 
 curses upon the other. Nin-ki-gal 
 hereupon opened her mouth, and 
 spake : ' Go, Namtar, .... and bring 
 her out for punishment, . . . afflict her 
 with disease of the eye, the side, the 
 feet, the heart, the head (some lines 
 effaced) 
 
 " The Divine messenger of the gods 
 lacerated his face before them. The 
 assembly of the gods was full. . . . 
 The Sun came, along with the Moon, 
 his father, and weeping he spake thus 
 unto Hea, the king : ' Ishtar has de- 
 scended into the earth, and has not 
 risen again ; and ever since the time 
 that Mother Ishtar descended into 
 hell, .... the master has ceased 
 from' commanding; the slave has 
 ceased from obeying.' Then the god 
 Hea in the depth of his mind formed 
 a design ; he modeled, for her escape, 
 the figure of a man of clay. ' Go to 
 save her, Phantom, present thyself at 
 the portal of Hades ; the seven gates 
 of Hades will all open before thee ; 
 Nin-ki-gal will see thee, and take 
 pleasure because of thee. When her 
 mind has grown calm, and her anger 
 has worn itself away, awe her with the 
 names of the great gods ! Then pre- 
 pare thy frauds ! Fix on deceitful 
 tricks thy mind ! Use the chiefest of 
 thy tricks ! Bring forth fish out of an 
 empty vessel ! That will astonish Nin- 
 ki-gal, and to Ishtar she will restore 
 her clothing. The reward a great 
 reward for these things shall not 
 fail. Go, Phantom, save her, and the 
 great assembly of the people shall 
 crown thee ! Meats, the best in the 
 city, shall be thy food ! Wine, the 
 most delicious in the city, shall be thy 
 drink ! A royal palace shall be thy 
 
 dwelling, a throne of state shall be 
 thy seat! Magician and conjurer 
 shall kiss the hem of thy garment ! ' 
 
 " Nin-ki-gal opened her mouth and 
 spake : to her messenger, Namtar, 
 commands she gave: 'Go, Namtar, 
 the Temple of Justice adorn ! Deck 
 the images ! Deck the altars ! Bring- 
 out Anunnak, and let him take his 
 seat on a throne of gold ! Pour out 
 for Ishtar the water of life; from 
 my realms let her depart.' Namtar 
 obeyed ; he adorned the Temple ; 
 decked the images, decked the altars ; 
 brought out Anunnak, and let him 
 take his seat on a throne of gold ; 
 poured out for Ishtar the water of 
 life, and suffered her to depart. Then 
 the first gate let her out, and gave her 
 back the garment of her form. The 
 next gate let her out, and gave her 
 back the jewels for her hands and 
 feet. The third gate let her out, and 
 gave her back the girdle for her waist. 
 The fourth gate let her out, and gave 
 her back the small gems she had worn 
 upon her brow. The fifth gate lei 
 her out, and gave her back the precious 
 stones that had been upon her head. 
 The sixth gate let her out, and gave 
 her back the ear-rings that were taken 
 from her ears. And the seventh gale 
 let her out, and gave her back the 
 crown she had carried on her head?' 
 
 So ends this curious legend, and 
 with it the limits of our space re- 
 quire that we should terminate this 
 notice of the religion of the Assyrians 
 and Babylonians. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE RELIGION OF THE ANCIENT 
 IRANIANS. 
 
 6vo na-f avrovs elvai apx&?, 
 ayaObv dai(j.ova nal KCLKOV dalfjiova. DiOG. 
 Laert. Proem, /. 2. 
 
 74. THE Iranians were in ancient 
 times the dominant race throughout 
 the entire tract lying between the 
 Suliman mountains and the Pamir 
 steppe on the one hand, and the great 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [107] 2 
 
 Mesopotamia valley on the other. 
 Intermixed in portions of the tract 
 with a Cushite or Nigritic, and in 
 others with a Turanian element, they 
 possessed, nevertheless, upon the 
 whole, a decided preponderance ; and 
 the tract itself has been known as 
 " Ariana," or " Iran," at any rate from 
 the time of Alexander the Great to 
 the present day ! * The region is one 
 in which extremes are brought into 
 sharp contrast, and forced on human 
 observation, the summers being in- 
 tensely hot, and the winters piercingly 
 cold, the more favored portions luxuri- 
 antly fertile, the remainder an arid 
 and frightful desert. If, as seems to 
 be now generally thought by the best 
 informed and deepest investigators,t 
 the light of primeval relation very 
 early faded away in Asia, and religions 
 there were in the main elaborated out 
 of the working upon the circumstances 
 of his environment, of that " religious 
 faculty " wherewith God had endowed 
 mankind, we might expect that in this 
 peculiar* region a peculiar religion 
 should develop itself a religion of 
 strong antitheses and sharp contrasts, 
 unlike that of such homogeneous tracts 
 as the Nile valley and the Mesopota- 
 mian plain, where climate was almost 
 uniform, and a monotonous fertility 
 spread around universal abundance. 
 The fact answers to our natural antici- 
 pation. At a time which it is difficult 
 to date, but which those best skilled 
 in Iranian antiquities are inclined to 
 place before the birth of Moses, $ there 
 grew up, in the region whereof we are 
 speaking, a form of religion marked 
 by very special and unusual features, 
 very unlike the religions of Egypt and 
 Assyria, a thing quite sui generis, one 
 very worthy of the attention of those 
 who are interested in the past history 
 of the human race, and more espe- 
 
 * Strabo, who is the earliest of extant writ- 
 ers to use " Ariana " in this broad sense, 
 probably obtained the term from the contem- 
 poraries of Alexander. It was certainly used 
 by Apollodorus of Artemita (ab. B.C. 130). 
 
 t See Max Miiller, " Introduction to the 
 Science of Religion," Lecture I. pp. 40, 41. 
 
 \ Haug, " Essays on the Religion, etc., of 
 the Parsees," p. 255. 
 
 cially of such as wish to study the 
 history of religions. 
 
 75. Ancient tradition associates this 
 religion with the name of Zoroaster. 
 Zoroaster, or Zarathrustra, according 
 to the native spelling,* was, by one 
 account,! a Median king who con- 
 quered Babylon about B.C. 2458. By 
 another, which is more probable, and 
 which rests, moreover, on better au- 
 thority, he was a Bactrian,$ who, at a 
 date not quite so remote, came for- 
 ward in the broad plain of the middle 
 Oxus to instill into the minds of his 
 countrymen the doctrines and precepts 
 of a new religion. Claiming divine 
 inspiration, and professing to hold 
 from time to time direct conversation 
 with the Supreme Being, he delivered 
 his revelations in a mythical form, and 
 obtained their general acceptance as 
 divine by the Bactrian people. His 
 religion gradually spread from " happy 
 Bactra," "Bactfa of the lofty ban- 
 ner,'^ first to the neighboring coun- 
 tries, and then to all the numerous 
 tribes of the Iranians, until at last it 
 became the established religion of the 
 mighty empire of Persia, which, in the 
 middle of the sixth century before our 
 era, established itself on the ruins of 
 the Assyrian and Babylonian king- 
 doms, and shortly afterward overran 
 and subdued the ancient monarchy 
 of the Pharaohs. In Persia it main- 
 tained its ground, despite the shocks 
 of Grecian and Parthian conquest, 
 until Mohammedan intolerance drove 
 it out at the point of the sword, and 
 forced it to seek a refuge further east, 
 in the peninsula of Hindustan. Here 
 it still continues, in Gtizerat and in 
 Bombay, the creed of that ingenious 
 and intelligent people known to An- 
 glo-Indians and may we not say to 
 Englishmen generally ? as Parsees. 
 
 76. The religion of the Parsees is 
 contained in a volume of some size, 
 
 * See " Zendavesta,"/<z.m#z. 
 
 t Berosus ap. Syncell. " Chronographia," p. 
 
 147. 
 
 \ Hermipp. ap. Arnob. " Adv. Gentes," i. 
 52; Justin, i. i ; Amm. Marc, xxiii. 6; Moses 
 Choren. " Hist. Armen." i. 5. 
 
 " Vendidad," Farg. ii. s. 7. 
 
80 [1031 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 which has received the name of " the 
 Zendavesta.'' * Subjected for the last 
 fifty years to the searching analysis 
 of first-rate orientalists Burnouf, 
 Westergaard, Brockhaus, Spiegel, 
 Haug, Windischmann, Hiibschmann 
 this work has been found to belong 
 in its various parts to very different 
 dates, and to admit of being so dis- 
 sected t as to reveal to us, not only 
 what are the tenets of the modern 
 Parsees, but what was the earliest 
 form of that religion whereof theirs is 
 the remote and degenerate descendant. 
 Signs of a great antiquity are found 
 to attach to the language of certain 
 rhythmical compositions, called Ga- 
 thas or hymns ; and the religious ideas 
 contained in these are found to be at 
 once harmonious, and also of a sim- 
 pler and more primitive character 
 than those contained in the rest of 
 the volume. From the Gathas chiefly, 
 but also to some extent from other, 
 apparently very ancient, portions of 
 the Zendavesta, the characteristics of 
 the early Iranian religion have been 
 drawn out by various scholars, partic- 
 ularly by Dr. Martin Haug; and it is 
 from the labors of these writers, in the 
 main, that we shall be content to 
 draw our picture of the religion in 
 question. 
 
 77. The most striking feature of 
 the religion, and that which is gener- 
 ally allowed to be its leading charac- 
 teristic, is the assertion of Dualism. 
 By Dualism we mean the belief in two 
 original uncreated principles, a princi- 
 ple of good and a principle of evil. 
 This creed was not perhaps contained 
 in the teaching of Zoroaster himself,}: 
 
 * Anquetil Duperron introduced the sacred 
 book of the Pavsees to the knowledge of Eu- 
 ropeans under this name ; and the word thus 
 introduced can scarcely be now displaced. 
 Otherwise " Avesta-Zend " might be recom- 
 mended as the more proper title. " Avesta" 
 means "text," and "Zend" means "com- 
 ment." "Avesta u Zend," or "Text and 
 Comment" is the proper title, which is then 
 contracted into " Avesta-Zend." 
 
 f Haug, " Essays," pp. 136-138; Max Mul- 
 ler, " Introduction to the Science of Relig- 
 ion," pp. 26-29. 
 
 J See the Author's " Ancient Monarchies," 
 vol. iii. pp. 104, 105. 
 
 but it was developed at so early a date * 
 out of that teaching, that in treating 
 generally of the Iranian religion we 
 must necessarily regard Dualism as a 
 part of it. The Iranians of historic 
 times held that from all eternity there 
 had existed two mighty and rival be- 
 ings, the authors of all other existences, 
 who had been engaged in a perpetual 
 contest, each seeking to injure, baffle, 
 and in every way annoy and thwart the 
 other. Both principles were real per- 
 sons, possessed of will, intelligence, 
 power, consciousness, and other per- 
 sonal qualities. To the one they gave 
 the name of Ahura-Mazda, to the other 
 that of Angro-Mainyus. 
 
 78. Here let us pause for a mo- 
 ment, and consider the import of these 
 two names. Names of deities, as 
 Professor Max Miiller has well pointed 
 out,f are among the most interesting 
 of studies ; and a proper understand- 
 ing of their meaning throws frequently 
 very considerable light on the nature 
 and character of a religion. Now, 
 Ahura-Mazda is a word composed of 
 three elements: "Ahura," "maz," 
 " da." The first of these is properly 
 an adjective, signifying, "living; "it 
 corresponds to "asura" in Sanskrit, 
 and like that passes from an adjecti- 
 val to a substantival force, and is used 
 for " living being," especially for liv- 
 ing beings superior to man. Perhaps 
 it may be best expressed in English 
 by the word " spirit," only that we 
 must not regard absolute immaterial- 
 ity as implied in it. "Maz" is cog- 
 nate to the "maj" in major, and the 
 " mag " or " meg " in " magnus " and 
 pfr/af ; it is an intensitive, and means 
 " much." " Da " or " dao " is a word 
 of a double meaning ; it is a partici- 
 ple, or verbal adjective, and signifies 
 either "giving" or "knowing," being 
 connected with the Latin "do," 
 "dare" (Greek 6i6o/u), "to give," 
 and with the Greek dafjvai, 
 
 * The Second Fargard of the " Vendidad," 
 which from internal evidence may be pro- 
 nounced earlier than B.C. 800, is as strongly 
 Dualistic as any other portion of the volume. 
 
 t " Introduction to the Science of Relig- 
 ion," Lecture III. pp. 171 et seqq. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [109] 
 
 u< to know," "knowing." The entire 
 word, " Ahura-Mazda," thus means 
 either, " the much-knowing spirit," or 
 the "much-giving spirit," the "all- 
 bountiful," or " the all-wise." * 
 
 79. Angro-Mainyus contains two 
 elements only, an adjective and a sub- 
 stantive. "Angro" is akin to "ni- 
 ger," and so to " negro ; " it means 
 simply "black" or "dark." " Main- 
 yus," a substantive, is the exact equiv- 
 alent of the Latin "mens," and the 
 Greek pho?. It means "mind," 
 " intelligence." Thus Angro-Main- 
 yus is the " black or dark intelli- 
 gence." 
 
 80. Thus the names themselves 
 sufficiently indicated to those who 
 first used them the nature of the two 
 beings. Ahura-Mazda was the " all- 
 bountiful, all wise, living being" or 
 " spirit," who stood at the head of all 
 that was good and lovely, beautiful 
 and delightful. Angro-Mainyus was 
 the " dark and gloomy intelligence," 
 that had from the first been Ahura- 
 Mazda's enemy, and was bent on 
 thwarting and vexing him. And with 
 these fundamental notions agreed all 
 that the sacred books taught concern- 
 ing either being. Ahura-Mazda was 
 declared to be " the creator of life, 
 the earthly and the spiritual ; " he had 
 made " the celestial bodies," " earth, 
 water, and trees," "all good creat- 
 ures," and "all good, true things." 
 He was "good," "holy," "pure," 
 " true," " the holy god," " the holi- 
 est," "the essence of truth," "the 
 father of truth," "the best being of 
 ali," "the master of purity." Su- 
 premely happy, he possessed every 
 blessing, "health, wealth, virtue, wis- 
 dom, immortality."t From him came 
 all good to man on the pious and 
 the righteous he bestowed, not only 
 earthly advantages, but precious spir- 
 
 ary, 
 " Auramazda." 
 
 t The expressions in inverted commas are 
 all taken from Haug's translations of the 
 Yasna given in his "Essays." The exact 
 place of each is noted in the Author's " An- 
 cient Monarchies," vol. iii. p. 96. 
 
 itual gifts, truth, devotion, " the good 
 mind," and everlasting happiness ; 
 and, as he rewarded the good, so he 
 also punished the bad, although this 
 was an aspect in which he was but 
 seldom contemplated. 
 
 81. Angro-Mainyus, on the other 
 hand, was the creator and upholder 
 of everything that was evil. Op- 
 posed to Ahura-Mazda from the be- 
 ginning, he had been engaged in a 
 perpetual warfare with him. What- 
 ever good thing Ahura-Mazda had 
 created, Angro-Mainyus had cor- 
 rupted and ruined it.* Moral and 
 physical evils were alike at his dis- 
 posal. He could blast the earth 
 with barrenness, or make it produce 
 thorns, thistles, and poisonous plants ; 
 his were the earthquake, the storm, 
 the plague of hail, the thunderbolt; 
 he could cause disease and death, 
 sweep off a nation's flocks and herds 
 by murrain, or depopulate a Conti- 
 nent by pestilence ; ferocious wild 
 beasts, serpents, toads, mice, hornets, 
 mosquitoes, were his creation ; he 
 had invented and introduced into the 
 world the sins of witchcraft, murder, 
 unbelief, cannibalism ; he excited 
 wars and tumults, continually stirred 
 up the bad against the good, and la- 
 bored by every possible expedient 
 to make vice triumph over virtue. 
 Ahura-Mazda could exercise no con- 
 trol over him ; the utmost that he 
 could do was to keep a perpetual 
 watch upon his rival, and seek to 
 baffle and defeat him. This he was 
 not always able to dp ; despite his best 
 endeavors, Angro-Mainyus was not 
 unfrequently victorious. 
 
 82. The two great beings who 
 thus divided between them the em- 
 pire of the universe, were neither of 
 them content to be solitary. Each 
 had called into existence a number of 
 inferior spirits, who acknowledged 
 their sovereignty, fought on their side, 
 and sought to execute their behests. 
 At the head of the good spirits sub- 
 ject to Ahura-Mazda stood a band 
 
 * See the Second Fargard of the " Vendi- 
 dad," which is given at length in the above- 
 mentioned work, vol. iii. pp. 238-240. 
 
32 [110J 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 of six dignified with the title of 
 Amesha-Spentas, or " Immortal Holy 
 Ones," the chief assistants of the 
 Principle of Good both in counsel and 
 in action. These were Vohu-mano, 
 or Bahrnan, the " Good Mind " ; Asha- 
 vahista, or Ardibehesht, " the High- 
 est Truth ; " Khshathra-vairya, or 
 Shahravar, the genius of wealth : 
 Spenta-Armaiti (Island-armat), the 
 genius of the Earth : Haurvatat 
 (Khordad), the genius of Health : 
 and Ameretat (Amerdat), the genius 
 of Immortality.* In direct antithesis 
 to these stood the band, likewise one 
 of six, which formed the council and 
 chief support of Angro-Mainyus, 
 namely, Akomano, "-the Bad Mind " : 
 Indra, the god of storms : Saurva : 
 Naonhaitya : Taric : and Zaric.f Be- 
 sides these leading spirits there was 
 marshaled on either side an innu- 
 merable host cf lesser and subordinate 
 ones, called respectively ahuras and 
 devas, who constituted the armies or 
 attendants of the two great powers, 
 and were employed by them to work 
 out their purposes. The leader of the 
 angelic hosts, or ahuras, was a glori- 
 ous being, called Sraosha or Serosh \ 
 " the good, tall, fair Serosh," who 
 stood in the Zoroastrian system where 
 Michael the Archangel stands in the 
 Christian. The armies of Angro- 
 Mainyus had no such single leader, 
 but fought under the orders of a 
 number of co-equal captains, as 
 Drukhs, " destruction " : Aeshemo, 
 " rapine " : Daivis, " deceit " : Driwis, 
 " poverty " : and others. Offering 
 an uninterrupted and dogged resist- 
 
 * Haug, " Essays," p. 263 ; Pusey, " Lect- 
 ures on Daniel," pp. 536, 537. 
 
 t Haug, 1. s. c. ; Windischmann, " Zoroas- 
 trische Studient," p. 59. 
 
 \ On Serosh, see the Author's "Ancient 
 Monarchies," vol. iii. pp. 99, 112. 
 
 It is no doubt true, as Dr. Pusey ob- 
 serves (" Lectures on Daniel," p. 535), that 
 the character of the Amesha-Spentas, and of 
 the other great spirits or genii of the Zenda- 
 vesta, is altogether " below that of the holy 
 angels," and that the term " archangel," if 
 applied to any of them, is ".a misnomer " (Ibid. 
 p. 538). But still there is sufficient resem- 
 blance to make the comparison natural and 
 not improper. 
 
 ance to the army of Ahura-Mazda, 
 they maintained the struggle on some- 
 thing like equal terms, and showed no 
 sign of any intention to make their 
 submission. 
 
 83. Neither Ahura-Mazda nor the 
 Amesha-Spentas were represented by 
 the early Iranians under any material 
 forms. The Zoroastrian system was- 
 markedly anti-idolatrous : and the ut- 
 most that was allowed the worshiper 
 was an emblematic representation of 
 the Supreme Being by means of a 
 winged circle, with which was occa- 
 sionally combined an incomplete hu- 
 man figure, robed and wearing a tiara. 
 A four-winged figure at Murgab, the 
 ancient Pasargadae, is also possibly a 
 representation of Serosh ; out other- 
 wise the objects of their religious re- 
 gards were not exhibited in material 
 shapes by the early Iranians. 
 
 84. Among the angelic beings rev- 
 erenced by the Iranians lower than 
 the Amesha-Spentas, but still of a 
 very high rank and dignity, were 
 Mithra, the genius of light, early iden- 
 tified with the sun ; Tistrya, the Dog- 
 star;* Airyaman, a genius presiding 
 over marriage ; f and others. Mithra 
 was originally not held in very high 
 esteem ; but by degrees he was ad- 
 vanced, and ultimately came to occu- 
 py a place only a little inferior to that 
 assigned from the first to Ahura- 
 Mazda. Darius, the son of Hystaspes, 
 placed the emblems of Ahura-Mazda 
 and of Mithra in equally conspicuous 
 positions on the sculptured tablet 
 above his tomb ; and his example was 
 followed by all the later monarchs of 
 his race whose sepulchres are still 
 in existence. \ Artaxerxes Mnemon 
 placed an image of Mithra in the 
 temple attached to the royal palace at 
 Susa. He also in his inscriptions 
 unites Mithra with Ahura-Mazda, and 
 prays for their conjoint protection.! 
 Artaxerxes Ochus does the same a 
 
 * " Zendavesta," iii. 72 (Spiegel's edition). 
 
 t Haug, " Essays," p. 231. 
 
 \ See the Author's " Ancient Monarchies," 
 vol. iv. p. 334, and Flandin, " Voyage en 
 Perse," pis. 164, bis, 166, 173-176. 
 
 Loftus " Chaldaea and Susiana," p. 372. 
 
 il Ibid. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [Ill] 33 
 
 little later ; * and the practice is also 
 observed in portions of the Zenda- 
 vesta composed about this period, f 
 Ahura-Mazda and Mithra are called 
 " the two great ones," " the two great, 
 imperishable, and pure." $ 
 
 85. The position of man in the cos- 
 mic scheme was determined by the 
 fact that he was among the creations 
 of Ahura-Mazda. Formed and placed 
 on earth by the Good Being, he was 
 bound to render him implicit obedi- 
 ence, and to oppose to the utmost 
 Angro-Mainyus and his creatures. 
 His duties might be summed up under 
 the four heads of piety, purity, in- 
 dustry, and veracity. Piety was to 
 be shown by an acknowledgment of 
 Ahura-Mazda as the One True God, 
 by a reverential regard for the Ame- 
 sha-Spentas and the Izeds, or lower 
 angels, by the frequent offering of 
 prayers, praises, and thanksgivings, 
 the recitation of hymns, the occasional 
 sacrifice of animals, and the perform- 
 ance from time to time of a curious 
 ceremony known as that of the Ha- 
 oma or Homa. This consisted in the 
 extraction of the juice of the Homa 
 plant by the priests during the recita- 
 tion of prayers, the formal presenta- 
 tion of the liquid extracted to the sac- 
 rificial fire, the consumption of a small 
 portion of it by one of the officiating 
 ministers, and the division of the re- 
 mainder among the worshipers. In 
 sacrifices the priests were also neces- 
 sary go-betweens. The most ap- 
 proved victim was the horse ; || but it 
 was likewise allowable to offer oxen, 
 sheep, or goats. The animal having 
 been brought before an altar on which 
 burnt the sacred fire, kindled origin- 
 ally (according to the general belief) 
 from heaven, was there slain by a 
 priest, who took of the flesh and 
 
 * Sir H. Rawlinson " Cuneiform Inscrip- 
 tions," vol. i. p. 342. 
 
 t " Yasna," i. 34 ; ii. 44 ; iii. 48 ; " Mihr 
 Yasht," i [3. 
 
 J See Pusey's " Lectures on Daniel," 
 p. 542, note 3. 
 
 See Haug, " Essays," p. 239. 
 
 y "Yasna," xliv. 18. Compare Xen. 
 " Cyrop." v-iii. 3, 24 ; and Ovid, " Fasti," i. 
 38S- 
 
 showed it to the sacrificial fire, after 
 which the victim was cooked and 
 eaten at a solemn meal by the priests 
 and worshipers united. 
 
 86. The purity required of the Irani- 
 ans was inward as well as outward. 
 Outward purity had to be maintained 
 by a multiplicity of external observ- 
 ances,* forming in their entirety a 
 burden as heavy to bear as that im- 
 posed by the Mosaic ceremonial law 
 on the people of Israel. But inward 
 purity was not neglected. Not only 
 were the Iranians required to refrain 
 from all impure acts, but also from 
 impure words, and even from impure 
 thoughts. Ahura-Mazda was "the 
 pure, the master of purity," and would 
 not tolerate less than perfect purity in 
 his votaries. 
 
 87. The industry required by the 
 Zoroastrian religion was of a peculiar 
 kind. Man was placed upon the 
 earth to preserve Ahura-Mazda's 
 " good creation ; " and this could only 
 be done by careful tilling of the soil, 
 eradication of thorns and weeds, and 
 reclamation of the tracts over which 
 Angro-Mainyus had spread the curse 
 of barrenness. To cultivate the soil 
 was thus a religious duty: f the whole 
 community was required to be agricult- 
 ural ; and either as proprietor, as 
 farmer, or as laboring man, each Zo- 
 roastrian was bound to "further the 
 works of life " by advancing tillage. 
 
 88. The duty of veracity was incul- 
 cated perhaps more strenuously than 
 any other. "The Persian youth are 
 taught," says Herodotus,! " three 
 things, and three things only : to ride, 
 to draw the bow, and to speak the 
 truth." Ahura-Mazda was the " true 
 spirit," and the chief of the Amesha^ 
 Spentas was Asha-vahista, "the best 
 truth."- Druj, "falsehood," is held 
 up to detestation, alike in the Zenda- 
 vesta and in the Persian cuneiform 
 inscriptions, i| as the basest, the most 
 
 * " Vendidad," Farg. 8-u, and 16, 17. 
 t " Yasna," xxxiii. 3. 
 J Herod, i. 136. 
 " Yasna," xxxv. 3. 
 
 || Sir H. Rawlinson, " Cuneiform Inscrip- 
 tions." vol. i. pp. 200, 244, 245, etc. 
 
[112] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 contemptible, and the most pernicious 
 of vices. 
 
 89. If it be asked what opinions were 
 entertained by the Zoroastrians con- 
 cerning man's ultimate destiny, the 
 answer would seem to be, that they 
 were devout and earnest believers in 
 the immortality of the soul, and a con- 
 scious future existence. It was taught 
 that immediately after death the souls 
 of men, both good and bad, proceeded 
 together along an appointed path to 
 the "bridge of the gatherer." There 
 was a narrow road conducting to 
 heaven, or paradise, over which the 
 souls of the good alone could pass, 
 while the wicked fell from it into the 
 gulf below, where they found them- 
 selves in the place of punishment. 
 The pious soul was assisted across 
 the bridge by the angel Serosh, " the 
 
 happy, well-formed, swift, tall 
 rosh," who went out to meet 
 weary wayfarer, and sustained 
 steps as he effected the difficult pas- 
 sage. The prayers of his friends in 
 this world much availed the deceased, 
 and helped him forward greatly on 
 his journey. As he entered, the angel 
 Vohu-mano rose from his throne, and 
 greeted him with the words " How 
 happy art thou, who hast come here 
 to us, exchanging mortality for im- 
 mortality ! " Then the good soul 
 went joyfully onward to the golden 
 throne, to paradise. As for the 
 wicked, when they fell into the gulf, 
 they found themselves in outer dark- 
 ness, in the kingdom of Angro-Main- 
 yus, where they were forced to remain 
 in a sad and wretched condition.* 
 
 90. It has been maintained by 
 some that the early Iranians also 
 held the doctrine of the resurrection 
 of the body.f Such a doctrine is 
 certainly contained in the more re- 
 cent portions of the Zendavesta ; and 
 it is argued that there are expres- 
 sions in the more ancient parts of that 
 work which imply it, if they do not 
 actually assert it. But a careful ex- 
 amination of the passages adduced 
 
 * " Vendidad," xix. 30-32 ; 
 says," p. 156, 
 
 f Hang, " Essays," p. 266. 
 
 makes it evident, that no more is in 
 reality asserted in them than the 
 continued existence of the soul ; and 
 Spiegel comes to the conclusion that, 
 even so late as the time when the 
 " Vendidad " was written, " the res- 
 urrection of the body was not yet 
 known to the Parsees,"* or Persians. 
 
 91. The original 
 Iranians was Dualism of 
 
 religion 
 
 of the 
 a very pro- 
 
 nounced type, assigning, as it did, to 
 Angro-Mainyus complete independ- 
 ence of Ahura-Mazda, and equal 
 eternity with him, with almost equal 
 power. It verged upon polytheism 
 by the very important position which 
 it assigned to certain of the ahuras or 
 angels, whom it coupled with the 
 Principle of Good in a way which 
 derogated from his supreme and un- 
 rivaled dignity.f In its morality it 
 Se- maintained a high tone ; but it im- 
 the posed on its followers a burdensome 
 his yoke of ceremonial observances. It 
 taught a future life, with happiness 
 for the good and misery for the 
 wicked ; but unfortunately inclined 
 to identify goodness with orthodoxy, 
 and wickedness" with a rejection of 
 the doctrine of Zoroaster. 
 
 92. It may help the reader to un- 
 derstand the inner spirit of the re- 
 ligion, if we give one or two speci- 
 mens of the hymns which constituted 
 so important a part of the Zoroastrian 
 worship. The following is one of the 
 Gathas, and is by some assigned to 
 Zoroaster himself t: 
 
 " Now will I speak and proclaim to all who 
 have come to listen 
 
 Thy praise, Ahura-Mazda, and thine, O Vohu- 
 mano. 
 
 Asha ! I ask that thy grace may appear in 
 the lights of heaven. 
 
 Hear with your ears what is best, perceive 
 with your minds what is purest, 
 
 So that each man for himself may, before the 
 great doom cometh, 
 
 Choose the creed he prefers. May the wise 
 ones be on our side. 
 
 -* Spiegel, " A vesta," vol. ii. p. 248, 249. 
 
 t Pusey, " Lectures on Daniel," p. 535, n. 9. 
 
 | Hiibschmann, " Ein Zoroastrisches Lied, 
 f mit Riicksicht auf die Tradition, ubersetzt 
 Haug, " Es- | und erklart." Miinchen, 1872. Compare 
 | Max Mullen " Lectures on the Science of 
 1 Religion," pp. 237-239. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 35 
 
 These two Spirits are twins ; they made 
 known in times that are bygone 
 
 That which is good and evil, in thought, and 
 word, and action. 
 
 Rightly decided between them the good ; not 
 so the evil. 
 
 When these Two came together, first of all 
 
 they created 
 Life and death, that at last there might be for 
 
 such as are evil 
 Wretchedness, but for the good a happy blest 
 
 existence. 
 
 Of these Two the One who was evil chose 
 
 what was evil ; 
 He who was kind and good, whose robe was 
 
 the changeless Heaven, 
 Chose what was right; those, too, whose 
 
 works pleased Ahura-Mazda. 
 
 They could not rightly discern who erred and 
 
 worshiped the Devas ; 
 They the Bad Spirit chose, and, having held 
 
 counsel together, 
 Turned to Rapine, that so they might make 
 
 man's life an affliction. 
 
 But to the good came might ; and with might 
 
 came wisdom and virtue ; 
 Armaiti herself, the Eternal, gave to their 
 
 bodies 
 Vigor ; e'en thou wert enriched bv the gifts 
 
 that she scattered, O Mazda. 
 
 Mazda, the time will come when the crimes 
 of the bad shall be punished ; 
 
 Then shall thy power be displayed in fitly re- 
 warding the righteous 
 
 Them that have bound and delivered up 
 falsehood to Asha the Truth-God. 
 
 Let us then be of those who advance this 
 world and improve it, 
 
 O Ahura-Mazda, O Truth-God bliss con- 
 ferring ! 
 
 Let our minds be ever there where wisdom 
 abideth ! 
 
 Then indeed shall be seen the fall of perni- 
 cious falsehood ; 
 
 But in the house where dwel) Vohu-mano, 
 Mazda, and Asha 
 
 Beautiful house shall be gathered forever 
 such as are worthy. 
 
 O men, if you but cling to the precepts Mazda 
 has given, 
 
 Precepts, which to the bad are a torment, but 
 joy to the righteous, 
 
 Then shall you one day find yourselves vic- 
 torious through them." 
 
 Our other specimen is taken from .the 
 " Yasna," or " Book on Sacrifice," 
 and is probably some centuries later 
 than the great bulk of the Gathas*: 
 
 ; " We worship Ahura-Mazda, the pure, the 
 
 master of purity : 
 
 We worship the Amesha-Spentas, possessors 
 and givers of blessings : 
 
 We worship the whole creation of Him who 
 
 is True, the heavenly, 
 With the terrestrial, all that supports the 
 
 good creation, 
 All that favors the spread of the good Mazd- 
 
 yasna* religion. 
 
 We praise whatever is good in thought, in 
 
 word, or in action, 
 Past or future ; we also keep clean whatever 
 
 is excellent. 
 
 O Ahura-mazda, thou true and happy being ! 
 We strive both to think, and to speak, and 
 
 to do whatever is fittest 
 Both our lives t to preserve, and bring them 
 
 both to perfection. 
 
 Holy Spirit of Earth, for our best works'^ 
 
 sake, we entreat thee, 
 Grant us beautiful fertile fields aye, grant 
 
 them to all men, 
 Believers and unbelievers, the wealthy and 
 
 those that have nothing." 
 
 93. The religion of the early Irani- 
 ans became corrupted after a time by 
 an admixture of foreign superstitions. 
 The followers of Zoroaster, as they 
 spread themselves from their original 
 seat upon the Oxus over the regions 
 lying south and south-west of the Cas- 
 I pian Sea, were brought into contact 
 with a form of faith considerably dif- 
 ferent from that to which they had 
 previously been attached, yet well 
 adapted for blending with it. This 
 was Magism, or the worship of the 
 elements. The early inhabitants of 
 Armenia, Cappadocia, and the Zagros 
 mountain-range, had, under circum- 
 stances that are unknown to us, de- 
 veloped this form of religion, and had 
 associated with its tenets a priest-caste, 
 claiming prophetic powers, and a 
 highly sacerdotal character. The es- 
 sentials of the religion were these : 
 the four elements, fire, air, earth, and 
 
 * Haug, " Essays," pp. 162, 163. 
 
 * " Mazd-yasna " means " Ahura-mazda 
 worshiping." Mazdisn was used commonly 
 to designate the orthodox, under the Sassa- 
 nians. 
 
 t The two lives are " the life of the soul " 
 and " the life of the body " (Haug, " Essays," 
 1. s. c.). 
 
 \i.e. " our agricultural labors " (ibid.}. 
 
38 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 water, were recognized as the only 
 proper objects of human reverence. 
 Personal gods, and together with them 
 temples, shrines, and images, were re- 
 jected. The devotion of the worship- 
 ers was paid, not to any powers pre- 
 siding over the constituent parts of 
 nature, but to those constituent parts 
 themselves. Fire, as the most subtle 
 and ethereal principle, and again as 
 the most powerful agent, attracted es- 
 pecial regard ; and on the fire-altars 
 of the Magians the sacred flame, gen- 
 erally regarded as kindled from 
 heaven, was kept uninterruptedly burn- 
 ing from year to year, and from age 
 to age, by bands of priests, whose spe- 
 cial duty it was to see that the sacred 
 spark was never extinguished. To 
 defile the altar by blowing the flame 
 with one's breath was a capital of- 
 fense, and to burn a corpse was re- 
 garded as equally odious. When vic- 
 tims weie offered, nothing but a small 
 portion of the fat was consumed in 
 the flames. Next to fire, water was 
 reverenced. Sacrifice was offered to 
 rivers, lakes, and fountains, the victim 
 being brought near to them and then 
 slain, while the utmost care was taken 
 that no drop of their blood should 
 touch the water and pollute it. No 
 refuse was allowed to be cast into a 
 river, nor was it even lawful to wash 
 one's hands in one. Reverence for 
 earth was shown by sacrifice and by 
 abstention from the usual mode of 
 burying the dead.* 
 
 94. The Magian priest-caste held 
 an exalted position. No worshiper 
 could perform any rite of the religion 
 unless by the intervention of a priest, 
 who stood between him and the Deity 
 as a mediator.f The Magus prepared 
 the victim and slew it, chanted the 
 mystic strain which gave the sacrifice 
 all its force, poured on the ground the 
 propitiatory libation of oil, milk, and 
 honey, and held the bundle of thin 
 tamarisk twigs, the barsom (baresma) 
 of the later Zend books, the employ- 
 
 * The chief authorities for this description 
 are Herodotus (i. 132), Strabo (xv. 3, 13, 
 14.) and Agathias (ii. 24). 
 
 t Herod. 1. s. c. ; Amm. Marc, xxiii. 6. 
 
 ment of which was essential to every 
 sacrificial ceremony.* Claiming su- 
 pernatural powers, they explained 
 omens, expounded dreams, and by 
 means of a certain mysterious manipu- 
 lation of the barsom, or bundle of tam- 
 arisk twigs,f arrived at a knowledge 
 of future events, which they would 
 sometimes condescend to communi- 
 cate to the pious inquirer. 
 
 95. With such pretensions it was 
 natural that the caste should assume 
 a lofty air, a stately dress, and an en- 
 vironment of ceremonial magnificence. 
 Clad in white robes, and bearing upon 
 their heads tall felt caps, with long 
 lappets at the sides, which (we are 
 told ||) concealed the jaw and even 
 the lips, each with his barsom in his 
 hand, they marched in procession to 
 the fire- altars, and standing round 
 them performed for an hour at a time 
 their magical incantations. The cred- 
 ulous multitude, impressed by sights 
 of this kind, and imposed on by the 
 claims to supernatural powers which 
 the Magi put forward, paid them a 
 willing homage; the kings and chiefs 
 consulted them ; and when the Irani- 
 ans, pressing westward, came into con- 
 tact with the races professing the 
 Magian religion, they found the Ma- 
 gian priest-caste all-powerful in most 
 of the western nations. 
 
 96. Originally Zoroastrianism had 
 been intolerant and exclusive. Its 
 first professors had looked with aver- 
 sion and contempt on the creed of 
 their Indian brethren ; they had been 
 fierce opponents of idolatry, and abso- 
 lutely hostile to every form of religion 
 except that which they had themselves 
 worked out. But with the lapse of 
 time these feelings had grown weaker. 
 The old religious fervor had abated. 
 An impressible and imitative spirit 
 had developed itself. When the Zo- 
 roastrians came into contact with 
 Magism, it impressed them favorably. 
 There was no contradiction between 
 its main tenets and those of their old 
 religion ; they were compatible, and 
 
 * Strabo, 1. s. c. 
 
 t Dino, Fr. 8; Schol. ad. Nic. Ther. 613. 
 
 t Strabo, xv. 3, 15 ; Diog. Laert. " Proem." 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [115] 37 
 
 might readily be held together; and 
 the result was, that, without giving up 
 any part of their previous creed, the 
 Iranians adopted and added on to it 
 all the principal points of the Magian 
 belief, and all the more remarkable of 
 the Magian religious usages. This 
 religious fusion seems first to have 
 taken place in Media. The Magi be- 
 came a Median tribe,* and were 
 adopted as the priest-caste of the Me- 
 dian nation. Elemental worship, div- 
 ination by means of the barsom, dream- 
 expounding, incantations at the fire- 
 altars, sacrifices whereat a Magus 
 officiated, were added on to the old 
 dualism and qualified worship of the 
 Amesha-Spentas, of Mithra, and of 
 the other ahuras ; and a mixed or 
 mongrel religion was thus formed, 
 which long struggled with, and ulti- 
 mately prevailed over, pure Zoroastri- 
 anism.f The Persians after a time 
 came into this belief, accepted the 
 Magi 'for their priests, and attended 
 the ceremonies at the fire-altars. 
 
 97. The adoption of elemental wor- 
 ship into the Iranian system produced 
 a curious practice with regard to dead 
 bodies. It became unlawful to burn 
 them, since that would be a pollution 
 of fire ; or to bury them, thereby pol- 
 luting earth ; or to throw them into a 
 river, thereby polluting water ; or even 
 to place them :n a sepulchral cham- 
 ber, or a sarcophagus, since that would 
 cause a pollution of air. What, then, 
 was to be done with them ? In what 
 way were they to be disposed of ? 
 Some races of men, probably moved 
 by these scruples, adopted the prac- 
 tice, which they regarded as emi- 
 nently pious, of killing those who, they 
 suspected, were about to die, and 
 then eating them.t But the Iranians 
 had reached that stage of civilization 
 when cannibalism is held to be dis- 
 gusting. Disinclined to devour their 
 
 * Herod, i. 101. 
 
 T See WestergaarcTs " Introduction to the 
 Zenda vesta," p. 17; and compare the Au- 
 thor's " Essay on the Religion of the Ancient 
 Persians " in his " Herodotus," vol. i. pp. 414- 
 419, ^d edition. 
 
 ] Herod, i 216 ; iii. 99. 
 
 dead themselves, they hit on an expe- 
 dient which, without requiring them 
 to do what they 30 much disliked, 
 had the same result transferred, that 
 is, the bodies of their departed friends 
 into those of other living organisms, 
 and so avoided the pollution of any 
 element by their decaying remains. 
 Immediately after death' they removed 
 the bodies to a solitary place, and 
 left them to be devoured by beasts 
 and birds of prey, crows, ravens, vult- 
 ures, wolves, jackals, and foxes. 
 This was the orthodox practice,* was 
 employed by the Magi themselves in 
 the case of their own dead, and was 
 earnestly recommended to others ;t 
 but as it was found that, despite all 
 exhortations, there were some whose 
 prejudices would not allow them to 
 adopt this method, another had to be 
 devised and allowed, though not rec- 
 ommended. This was the coating of 
 the dead body with wax previous- 
 ly to its deposition in the ground, t 
 Direct contact between the corpse 
 and the earth being in this way pre- 
 vented, pollution was supposed to be 
 avoided. 
 
 98. The mixed religion thus con- 
 stituted, though less elevated and 
 less pure than the original Zoroas- 
 trian creed, must be pronounced to 
 have possessed a certain loftiness and 
 picturesqueness which suited it to 
 become the religion of a great and 
 splendid monarchy. The mysterious 
 fire-alcars upon the mountain-tops, 
 with their prestige cf a remote antiq- 
 uity the ever-burning flame believed 
 to have been kindled from on high 
 the worship in the open air under the 
 blue canopy of heaven the long 
 troops of Magians in their white 
 robes, with their strange caps, and 
 their mystic wands the frequent 
 prayers, the abundant sacrifices, the 
 low incantations the supposed pro- 
 phetic powers of the priest-caste all 
 this together constituted an imposing 
 whole at once to the eye and to the 
 
 * Strabo, xv. 3, 20. Compare Herod, i- 
 140. 
 
 1 " Vendidad," Farg. v. to viii. 
 | Herod. 1. s. c.; Strabo, 1. s. c. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 mind, and was calculated to give addi- 
 tional grandeur to the civil system 
 that should be allied with it. Pure 
 Zoroastrianism was too spiritual to 
 coalesce readily with Oriental luxury 
 and magnificence, or to lend strength 
 to a government based on the princi- 
 ples of Asiatic despotism. Magism 
 furnished a hierarchy to support the 
 throne and add splendor and dignity 
 to the court, while it overawed the 
 subject class by its supposed posses- 
 sion of supernatural powers and of 
 the right of mediating between man 
 and God. It supplied a picturesque 
 worship, which at once gratified the 
 senses and excited the fancy. It gave 
 scope to man's passion for the mar- 
 velous by its incantations, its divin- 
 ing-rods, its omen-reading, and its 
 dream-expounding. It gratified the 
 religious scrupulosity which finds a 
 pleasure in making to itself difficul- 
 ties, by the disallowance of a thousand 
 natural acts, and the imposition of 
 numberless rules for external purity. 
 At the same time it gave no offense 
 to the anti-idolatrous spirit in which 
 the Iranians had always gloried, but 
 upheld and encouraged the icono- 
 clasm which they had previously prac- 
 ticed. It thus blended easily with 
 the previous creed of the Iranian peo- 
 ple, and produced an amalgam that 
 has shown a surprising vitality, hav- 
 ing lasted above two thousand years 
 from the time of Xerxes, the son of 
 Darius Hystaspis (B.C. 485-465) to 
 the present day. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE RELIGION OF THE EARLY 
 KRITIC INDIANS. 
 
 SANS- 
 
 was an extensive polytheism, but a 
 polytheism of a very peculiar charac- 
 ter. There lay behind it, at its first 
 formation, no conscious monotheism, 
 no conception of a single supreme 
 power, from whom man and nature, 
 and all the forces in nature, have their 
 origin. If we hold, as I believe we 
 do right to hold, that God revealed 
 Himself to the first parents of the hu- 
 man race as a single personal being, 
 and so that all races of men had at 
 the first this idea as an inheritance 
 handed down to them traditionally 
 from their ancestors, yet it would seem 
 certain that in India, before the relig- 
 ion which we find in the Vedas arose, 
 this belief had completely faded away 
 and disappeared; the notion of 
 " God " had passed into the notion of 
 " gods ; " a real polytheism universally 
 prevailed, even with the highest class 
 of intellects ; * and when, in the 
 course of time, monotheistic ideas 
 showed themselves, they sprang up in 
 individual minds as the results of in- 
 dividual speculation, f and were ut- 
 tered tentatively, not as doctrines, but 
 as hypotheses, as timid "guesses at 
 truth," on the part of those who con- 
 fessed that they knew little or noth- 
 ing. 
 
 100. If it be asked how this forge t- 
 fulness came about, how the idea of 
 one God, once possessed, could ever 
 be lost, perhaps we may find an an- 
 swer in that fact to which the tradi- 
 tions of the race and some of their 
 peculiar expressions $ point back, that 
 for many centuries they had been lo- 
 cated in one of the cruellest regions 
 of the earth, a region with " ten 
 months of winter and two months of 
 summer," where the struggle for ex- 
 istence must have been terrible in- 
 
 "Le pantheisme naturaliste et le polythe- 
 isme, sa consequence inevitable, s' et'aient 
 graduellement introduits dans les croyances 
 des Aryas." LENORMANT. Manuel d 1 Histoire 
 Ancienne, vol. iii. p. 309. 
 
 99. THE religion of -the early In- 
 dians, like that of the Egyptians, and 
 like that of Assyrians and Babylonians, 
 
 * See Max Miiller, " Ancient Sanskrit Lit- 
 erature," pp. 528, 529. 
 
 t Ibid. p. 559. 
 
 J As the expression, " a hundred winters" 
 used for a hundred years. (See H. H. Wil- 
 son's " Introduction to the Rig-Veda," vol. i. 
 p. xlii.) 
 
 See the description of " Aryanem vaejo "' 
 the old home of the Aryans in the First 
 Fargard of the " Vendidad " (" Ancient Mon- 
 archies," vol. ii. p. 432). 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 in- 
 
 deed, and all their energies, all their 
 time, all their thought, must have been 
 spent on the satisfaction of those phys- 
 ical needs for which provision must 
 be made before man can occupy him- 
 self with the riddle of the universe. 
 At any rate, however we may account 
 for it, or whether we can account for 
 it or no, the fact remains ; somehow 
 or other the Sanskritic Indians had 
 ceased to " retain God in their knowl- 
 edge ; " * they were for a time " with- 
 out God in the world," they had lost 
 the sense of His " eternal power and 
 Godhead ; " f they were in the condi- 
 tion that men would be in who should 
 be veritable "children of the soil," 
 springing into life without inheritance 
 of ancestral notions. 
 
 101. But there was one thing which 
 they could not be without. God has 
 implanted in all men a religious fac- 
 ulty, a religious instinct, which is an 
 essential portion of their nature and 
 among the faculties which most dis- 
 tinguish man from the brutes. No 
 sooner was the tension produced by 
 the severe character of their surround- 
 ings relaxed no sooner did the plains 
 of the Punjab receive the previous 
 dwellers in the Hindu Kush than 
 this instinct asserted itself, perceived 
 that there was something divine in the 
 world, and proceeded to the manu- 
 facture of deities. Nature seemed 
 to the Hindoo not to be one, but 
 many ; and all nature seemed to be 
 wonderful, and, so, divine. The sky, 
 the air, the dawn, the sun, the earth, 
 the moon, the wind, the storms, the 
 fire, the waters, the rivers, attracted his 
 attention, charmed him, sometimes 
 terrified him, seemed to him instinct 
 with power and life, became to him 
 objects of admiration and then of 
 worship. At first, it would appear, 
 the objects themselves were adored ; 
 but the objects received names ; the 
 names were, by the laws of Indian 
 grammar, masculine or feminine ; and 
 the named objects thus passed into 
 person s,-t the nomina became numina, 
 
 * Romans i. 28. t Romans i. 20. 
 
 \ Max Miiller, " Lectures on the Science of 
 Religion," pp. 54-56. 
 
 beings quite distinct from the objects 
 themselves, - presiding over them, di- 
 recting them, ruling them, but having 
 a separate and another kind of exist- 
 
 ence. 
 
 102. And now the polytheism, al- 
 ready sufficiently extensive through 
 the multiplicity of things natural, took 
 a fresh start. The names, having be- 
 come persons, tended to float away 
 from the objects ; and the objects re- 
 ceived fresh names, which in their 
 turn were exalted into gods, and so 
 swelled the pantheon. When first 
 the idea of counting the gods pre- 
 sented itself to the mind of a Vedic 
 poet, and he subjected them to a 
 formal census, he found them to 
 amount to no more than thirty-three.* 
 But in course of time this small band 
 swelled into a multitude, and Visva- 
 mitra, a somewhat late poet, states 
 the number at 3339.! 
 
 103. One of the features most 
 clearly pronounced in the Vedic poly- 
 theism is that which has been already 
 noticed as obtaining to a considerable 
 extent both in the Egyptian and As- 
 syrian religions, t the feature which 
 has been called " Kathenotheism " or 
 " Henotheism." A Vedic worshiper, 
 for the most part, when he turned his 
 regards toward any individual deity, 
 forgot for the time being that there 
 was any other, and addressed the im- 
 mediate object of his adoration in 
 terms of as absolute devotion as if he 
 were the sole God whom he recog- 
 nized, the one and only Divine Being 
 in the entire universe. " In the first 
 hymn of the second Mandala, the god 
 Agni is called * the ruler of the uni- 
 verse/ ' the lord of men,' ' the wise 
 king, the father, the brother, the son, 
 the friend of man ; ' nay, all the pow- 
 ers and names of the other gods are 
 distinctly assigned to Agni." || Sim- 
 
 * Rig- Veda, viii. 30. (See Max Miiller's 
 " Ancient Sanskrit Literature," p. 31.) 
 
 t " Rig- Veda Sanhita " (translation of H. 
 H. Wilson), vol. iii. p. 7. 
 
 J See above, pp. 40 and 56. 
 
 Max Miiller, " Chips from a German 
 Workshop," vol. i. p. 28 ; " Science of Relig- 
 ion," p. 141. 
 
 !|" Chips," 1. s. c. 
 
40 [IIS] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD 
 
 ilarly, in another hymn, Varuna is 
 kk k the wise god,' the ' lord of all,' * the 
 lord of heaven and earth,' * the up- 
 holder of order,' ' he who gives to men 
 glory.'* It is the same with Indra 
 he is ' the ruler of all that moves,' the 
 ' mighty one,' ' he to whom there is 
 none like in heaven and earth : ' " f 
 "the gods," it is said, "do not reach 
 thee, Indra, nor men ; thou overcom- 
 est all creatures in strength." The 
 best authority tells us that " it would 
 be easy to find, in the numerous hymns 
 of the Veda, passages in which almost 
 every important deity is represented 
 as supreme and absolute." $ At the 
 same time there is no rivalry, no com- 
 parison of one god with another, no 
 conflict of opinion between the vota- 
 ries of different deities ; each is su- 
 preme and absolute in his turn, simply 
 because " all the rest disappear for a 
 moment from the vision of the poet, 
 and he only who is to fulfill their de- 
 sires stands in full light before the 
 eyes of the worshipers. " 
 
 104. Among the various deities 
 thus, in a certain sense, equalized, 
 there are three who may be said to 
 occupy, if not the chief, at any rate 
 the oldest place, since their names 
 have passed out of the sphere of mere 
 appellatives, and have become proper 
 names, the designations of distinct 
 persons. These are Varuna, Mitra, 
 and Indra originally, the Sky, the 
 Sun, and the Storm (or, perhaps, the 
 Day) but, in the Vedic hymns, only 
 slightly connected with any particular 
 aspects of nature, and not marked off 
 by any strong differences the one 
 from the other. Indra, indeed, is the 
 main object of adoration ; more than 
 one-third of the hymns in the earlier 
 part of the Rig- Veda are addressed to 
 him.)! He is "the sovereign of the 
 
 *" Ancient Sanskrit Literature," pp. 536, 
 537. t Ibid. p. 546. 
 
 J " Chips from a German Workshop," p. 
 28. Ibid. 
 
 !| Forty-five in the first Astaka, out of 121 ; 
 39 in the second, out of 118 ; 48 in the third, 
 out of 121 ; and 46 in the fourth, out of 140 
 altogether 178 out of 502. (See the " Introduc- 
 i ion " of Prof. H. H. Wilson to his " Trans- 
 lation of the Rig- Veda Sanhita.") 
 
 world," " the all-wise," " the bode of 
 truth," " the lord of the good," " the 
 animator of all," " the showerer of 
 benefits," "the fulfiller of the desire 
 of him who offers praise ; " * and, 
 with more or less of reference to his 
 original character, " the sender of 
 rain," " the giver of food," " the lord 
 of opulence," and " the wielder of 
 the thunderbolt." t Varuna is more 
 sparingly addressed; but, when ad- 
 dressed, is put quite upon a par with 
 Indra, joined with him in such phrases 
 as "sovereign Indra and Varuna," 
 " Indra and Varuna, sovereign rulers," 
 "divine Indra and Varuna," "mighty 
 Indra and Varuna," \ etc., and entreat- 
 ed to afford the worshiper, equally with 
 Indra, protection, long life, riches, 
 sons and grandsons, happiness. Mi- 
 tra is the usual companion of Varuna, 
 sharing with him in the fifth Mandala 
 eleven consecutive hymns, and else- 
 where joined with him frequently ; jj 
 they are " observers of truth," " im- 
 perial rulers of the world," " lords of 
 heaven and truth," " protectors of the 
 universe," " mighty deities," " far-see- 
 ing," " excelling in radiance ; " *R they 
 ! " uphold the three realms of light," 
 i " scatter foes," " guide men in the 
 i right "way," " send rain from heaven," 
 | " grant men their desires," ** " pro- 
 cure for them exceeding and perfect 
 felicity." ft They ride together in 
 one chariot, which " shines in the 
 firmament like lightning ; " $$ they 
 sustain the sun in his course, and con- 
 jointly cause the rain to fall ; they are 
 " possessed of irresistible strength,"$ 
 and " uphold the celestial and terres- 
 
 Rig-Veda, vol. 
 
 36, 145, 283; vol 
 
 PP- 
 Hi. pp. 157, 159, and 166. 
 
 t Ibid. vol. ii. p. 283; vol. in. pp. 157 and 
 1 60. 
 
 \ " Rig- Veda," vol. i. p. 40 ; vol. iii. pp. 
 63, 201, 203, etc. 
 
 Ibid. vol. iii. pp. 347~357- 
 
 || As in vol. i. pp. 7, 117, and 230; vol. ii. 
 PP. 3-6, 53-55*59, etc. 
 
 If Wilsons Introduction, vol. in. pp. 
 
 349~354- 
 ** Wilson's " Introduction," vol. iii pp. 
 
 354-35 6 - 
 
 ^ Ibid. p. 349. 
 \\ Ibid. p. 348. 
 Ibid. pp. 353, 354. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [119] 41 
 
 trial worlds."* It can scarcely be 
 doubted that Mitra was once the 
 sun, as Mithra always was in Per- 
 sia ;f but in the hymns of the Rig- 
 Veda he has passed out of that subor- 
 dinate position, and has become a god 
 who sustains the sun, and who has a 
 general power over the elements. 
 His place as the actual sun-god has 
 been taken by another and distinct 
 deity, of whom more will be said pres- 
 ently. 
 
 105. Next to these three gods, 
 whose character is rather general 
 than special, must be placed Agni 
 the Latin ignis who is distinctly the 
 god of fire. Fire presented itself to 
 the early Indians under a twofold as- 
 pect ; $ first, as it exists on earth, on 
 the hearth, on the altar, and in the 
 conflagration ; secondly, as it exists in 
 the sky, in the shape of lightning, me- 
 teors, stars, comets, and light gener- 
 ally, so far as that is independent of 
 the sun. The earthly aspect of fire is 
 most dwelt upon. The Vedic poet 
 sees it leaping forth from darkness on 
 the rapid friction of two sticks in the 
 hands of a strong man. It is greedy 
 for food as it steps forth out of its 
 prison, it snorts like a horse as with 
 loud crackle it seizes and spreads 
 among the fuel. Then for a moment 
 its path is darkened by great folds of 
 smoke ; but it overcomes, it triumphs, 
 and mounts up in a brilliant column 
 of pure clear flame into the sky. As 
 culinary fire, Agni is the supporter of 
 life, the giver of strength and vigor, 
 the imparter of a pleasant flavor to 
 foocl,|i the diffuser of happiness in a 
 dwelling. As a sacrificial fire, he is 
 the messenger between the other gods 
 and man ; the interpreter to the other 
 
 .* Ibid. p. 356. 
 
 t See the Author's " Ancient Monarch- 
 ies," vol. ii. p. 328; vol. iii. pp. 348 and 
 
 J Wilson says " a three-fold aspect " (" In- 
 troduction to Rig- Veda," vol. i. p. xxvii.), dis- 
 tinguishing between the region of the air and 
 that of the sky; but the Vedic poets scarcely 
 make this distinction. 
 
 See Max Miilier, "Ancient Sanskrit 
 Literature," p. 547, note. 
 
 !i Rig- Veda, vol. iii. pp. 184, 247, etc. 
 
 gods of human wants; the all-wise, 
 who knows every thought of the wor- 
 shiper; the bestOA'er of all blessings 
 on men, since it is by his intervention 
 alone that their offerings are con- 
 veyed, and their wishes made known 
 to any deity. As conflagration, Agni 
 is " the consumer of forests, the dark- 
 pathed, the bright-shining." * " White- 
 hued, vociferous, abiding in the firm- 
 ament with the imperishable resound- 
 ing winds, the youngest of the gods, 
 Agni, purifying and most vast, pro- 
 ceeds, feeding upon numerous and 
 substantial forests. His bright flames, 
 fanned by the wind, spread wide in 
 every direction, consuming abundant 
 fuel; divine, fresh-rising, they play 
 upon the woods, enveloping them in 
 luster."f Occasionally, instead of 
 consuming forests, he devours cities 
 with their inhabitants. When the 
 Aryan Indians prevail over their en- 
 emies and give their dwellings to the 
 flames, it is Agni who " destroys the 
 ancient towns of the dispersed,":}: and 
 " consumes victorious all the cities of 
 the foe and their precious things." 
 Hence, he is constantly invoked 
 against enemies, and exhorted to 
 overthrow them, to give their cities to 
 destruction, to " burn them down like 
 pieces of dry timber," || to chastise 
 them and " consume them entirely." 
 In his celestial character, Agni, on 
 the other hand, is, comparatively 
 speaking, but rarely recognized. 
 Still, his frequent association with In- 
 dra IT ponts to this aspect of him. 
 Both he and Indra are " wielders of 
 thet hunderbolt ; " ** they occupy a 
 common car ; ft they are joint " slay- 
 ers of Vitra ; " $$ and Agni is described 
 in one place as " the agitator of the 
 clouds when the rain is poured forth," 
 
 * Rig-Veda, p. 391. 
 
 t Ibid. vol. iii. Compare pp. 136, 254, 
 385, etc. 
 
 J Ibid. p. 388. 
 
 Ibid. p. 1 6. 
 
 || Ibid. p. 126. 
 
 IT Mandala i. 21, 108 ; Mandala iii. 12; 
 Mandala v. 14 ; Mandala vi. 59 ; etc. 
 
 ** Rig- Veda, vol. iii. p. 500. 
 
 ft Ibid. p. 501. 
 
 Jt Ibid. vol. iii. pp. in, 503, etc. 
 
42 [120] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD 
 
 he who, " moving with the swiftness 
 of the wind, shines with a pure radi- 
 ance ; " whose " falling rays, accom- 
 panied by the moving storms, strike 
 against the cloud," which thereupon 
 " roars," after which " the shower 
 comes with delightful and smiling 
 drops, the rain descends, the clouds 
 thunder." * 
 
 1 06. After Agni we may place in 
 a single group, Dyaus, " the heaven ; " 
 Surya, or Savitri, " the sun ; " Soma, 
 " the moon ; " Ushas, " the dawn ; " 
 Prithivi, "the earth;" Vayu, "the 
 wind ; " Ap, " the waters ; " Nadi, 
 " the rivers ; " and the Maruts, " the 
 storms." These are all nature-gods of 
 a very plain and simple kind, corre- 
 sponding to the Greek Uranus, Hee- 
 lios, Selene, Eos, Ge, or Gaia, etc., 
 and to the Roman Ccelus, Apollo, 
 Luna, Aurora, Tellus, ^Eolus, etc. 
 Of all these the Maruts are the most 
 favorite objects of worship, having 
 twenty-four hymns devoted to them 
 in the first six Mandalas of the Rig- 
 Veda.f Next to these may be placed 
 Ushas, who has eleven hymns ; then 
 Dyaus and Prithivi, who share seven 
 hymns ; after these Surya, who has 
 six ; then Vayu, who has two ; then 
 Soma, who has one : and lastly, Ap 
 and Nadi, who are not worshiped sep- 
 arately at all. Ushas, the dawn, is 
 perhaps the most beautiful creation of 
 the Vedic bards. " She is the friend 
 of men ; she smiles like a young Wife ; 
 she is the daughter of the sky. She 
 goes to every house ; she thinks of 
 the dwellings of men ; she does not 
 despise the small or the great ; she 
 brings wealth; she is always the 
 same, immortal, divine ; age cannot 
 touch her ; she is the young god- 
 dess, but she makes men grow old." 
 Born again and again, and with bright 
 unchanging hues, she dissipates the 
 accumulated glooms, anoints her 
 beauty as the priests anoint the 
 
 * Ibid. vol. i. p. 202. 
 
 t See Wilson's " Introductions " to the 
 several volumes of the Rig-Veda Sanhita, 
 vol. i. p. 15 ; vol. iii. p. 7. 
 
 J Max Mtiller, " Ancient Sanskrit Litera 
 ture," p. 551. 
 
 sacrificial food in sacrifices, bright- 
 shining she smiles, like a flatterer, 
 to obtain favor, then lights up the 
 world, spreads, expanding west-ward 
 with her radiance, awakes men to 
 consciousness, calls forth the pleas- 
 ant sounds of bird and beast, arouses 
 all things that have life to their 
 several labors.* Sometimes a mere 
 natural appearance, more often a 
 manifest goddess, she comes before 
 men day after day with ever young 
 and fresh beauty, challenging their 
 admiration, almost forcing them to 
 worship her. The lazy inhabitants of 
 so-called civilized lands, who rarely 
 ieave their beds till the sun has been 
 up for hours, can scarcely understand 
 the sentiments with which a simple 
 race, that went to rest with the even- 
 ing twilight, awaited each morning 
 the coming of the rosy-fingered dawn, 
 or the ecstatic joy with which they 
 saw the darkness in the eastern sky- 
 fade and lift before the soft approach 
 of something tenderer and lovelier 
 than day. 
 
 107. Surya, "the sun," does not 
 play a prominent part in the Vedic 
 poems. f Out of the five hundred 
 hymns in Wilson's collection, only six 
 are devoted to him exclusively. $ 
 His presentation is nearly that of 
 Heelios in the Greek, and Phoebus 
 Apollo in the Roman mythology. 
 Brilliant, many-rayed, adorable, he 
 yokes each morning his two, or 
 seven, || swift coursers to his car, 
 and mounts up the steep incline of 
 heaven, following Ushas, as a youth 
 pursues a maiden, and destroying 
 her. IT Journeying onward at incredi- 
 
 * Rig- Veda, vol. i. pp. 236-238 and 298, 
 299. 
 
 t Wilson, " Introduction to Rig- Veda," 
 vol. i. p. xxxii. 
 
 J Mandala i. Suktas 50 and 115; Man- 
 dala ii. Sukta38 ; and Mandala v. Suktas Si 
 and 82. Surya has also a part in Mandala i. 
 Sukta 35 ; Mandala v. Suktas 40 and 45 ; and 
 Mandala vi. Sukta 50. 
 
 Rig- Veda, vol. i. p. 98. 
 
 II H>id. p. 133- 
 
 IF Ibid. p. 304. Compare Max Miiller's 
 " Ancient Sanskrit Literature," pp. 529, 530, 
 where the following comment of an Indian 
 critic is quoted : " It is fabled that Praja- 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [121] 
 
 ble speed * between the two regions 
 of heaven and earth, he pours down 
 his quickening, life-bestowing, purify- 
 ing rays on all, dispels diseases, t 
 gives fertility, and multiplies wealth. i 
 Having attained the summit of .the 
 sky, he commences his descent, and 
 traveling on a downward path, con- 
 ducts his car with safety to the far 
 limits of the west, carrying off with 
 him all the diffused rays of light, 
 and disappearing, no one knows 
 whither. || 
 
 108. Vayu, the "wind," generally 
 coupled with Indra as a god of heaven, 
 has only two whole hymns,H and parts 
 of five others, devoted to him in 
 Wilson's collection. What is chiefly 
 celebrated is his swiftness ; and in this 
 connection he has sometimes ninety- 
 nine, sometimes a hundred,** some- 
 times a thousand steeds,tt or even a 
 thousand chariots,$$ assigned to him. 
 The color of his horses is red or 
 purple. He is " swift as thought," 
 he has " a thousand eyes," and is " the 
 protector of pious acts." || || As one of 
 the gods who " sends rain," 1T1F he is 
 invoked frequently by the inhabitants 
 of a country where want of rain is 
 equivalent to a famine. Dyaus and 
 Prithivi, " heaven " and " earth," are 
 mostly coupled together, and ad- 
 dressed in the same hymns ; but, be- 
 
 pati, the Lord of Creation, did violence to 
 his daughter. But what does it mean ? Pra- 
 japati, the Lord of Creation, is a name of the 
 sun ; and he is called so because he protects 
 all creatures. His daughter, Ushas, is the 
 Dawn. And when it is said that he was in 
 love with her, this only means that, at sun- 
 rise, the sun runs after the dawn, the dawn 
 being at the same time called the daughter 
 of the sun, because she rises when he ap- 
 proaches." 
 
 * Ibid. vol. i. p. 132. 
 
 t Ibid. vol. i. pp. 99 and 134. 
 
 i Ibid. vol. ii. pp. 307, 309, etc. 
 
 Ibid. vol. i. p. 305. 
 
 || Ibid. p. 99. 
 
 I Mandala ii. Sukta 134; and Mandala vi. 
 Sukta 48. 
 
 ** Rig- Veda, vol. iii. p. 211. 
 tt Ibid. pp. 210 and 212. Compare vol. ii. 
 p. 49. 
 
 ii Ibid. vol. ii. p. 313. 
 
 Ibid. p. 46. 
 
 II II Ibid. vol. i. p. 55. 
 
 II Ibid. vol. iii. p. 487. 
 
 sides the joint addresses, Prithivi is 
 sometimes the sole subject of a sacred 
 poem.* Dyaus has occasionally the 
 epithet of pitar, or "father," f and 
 thus, so far as the name goes, undoubt- 
 edly corresponds with the Jupiter or 
 Diespiter of the Romans. But he is 
 certainly not in the same way the 
 " father," or creator, of the other gods. 
 Rather, some individual poets, in their 
 craving after divine sympathy and 
 communion, have ventured to bestow 
 on him the name of " father " excep- 
 tionally, not with any intention of 
 making him the head of the Pantheon, 
 but as claiming to themselves a share 
 in the Divine nature, and expressing 
 the same feeling as the Greek poet 
 when he said, '* For we are also his 
 offspring." \ 
 
 109. It is unnecessary to detain the 
 reader with a complete account of the 
 rest of the thirty-three gods. Some, 
 as Aditi, Pushan, Brahmaspati, Brih- 
 aspati, Panjaniya, seem to be mere 
 duplicate or triplicate names of deities 
 already mentioned. Others, as the 
 Aswins, Aryaman, Rudra, Vishnu, 
 Yama, belong to a lower grade, being 
 rather demigods or heroes than actual 
 deities. Others, again, are indistinct, 
 and of little importance, as Saraswati, 
 Bhaga, Twashtri, Parvata, Hotra, Bha- 
 rati, Sadi, Varutri, and Dhishana. 
 
 no Special attention must, however, 
 be called to Soma. By a principle of 
 combination which is quite inscrutable, 
 Soma represents at once the moon or 
 moon-god, and the genius presiding 
 over a certain plant. The assignment 
 of a sacred character to the Soma, or 
 Homa plant (Sarcostema viminalis)^ 
 was common to the Indie with the 
 Iranian religion, though the use made 
 of it in the two worships was different. 
 According to the ordinary spirit of 
 the Indie religion, a deity was required 
 to preside over, or personify, this im- 
 
 * Mandala v. Sukta 83. 
 
 t Max Miiller, " Science of Religion," p. 
 172. 
 
 i Acts xvii. 28. St. Paul, as is well known, 
 quoted Aratus. 
 
 H. H. Wilson, in notes to the Rig- Veda, 
 vol. i. p. 6, note a. 
 
44 [122] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 portant part of nature, and the god 
 chosen was the same that had the 
 moon under his protection. Hence 
 arises, in the hymns to Soma, a curi- 
 ous complication ; and it is often diffi- 
 cult to determine which view of the 
 god is present to the mind of the poet. 
 The notion of the plant is the predom- 
 inant one ; but intermixed with it in 
 the strangest way come touches which 
 can only be explained by referring 
 them to Soma's lunar character.* 
 
 in. The worship of their gods by 
 the Indians was of a very simple kind, 
 consisting of prayer, praise, and offer- 
 ings. It was wholly domestic, that is 
 to say, there were no temples or gen- 
 eral places of assembly ; but each 
 man in his dwelling-house, in a cham- 
 ber devoted to religious uses, per- 
 formed, or rather had performed for 
 him, the sacred rites which he pre- 
 ferred, and on which he placed his 
 dependence for material and perhaps 
 for spiritual blessings. An order of 
 /priests existed, by whom alone could 
 religious services be conducted ; and 
 of these a goodly array officiated on 
 -all occasions, the number being some- 
 times seven, at other times as many 
 as sixteen.f It was not necessary for 
 the worshiper to appear personally, 
 or to take any part in the ceremony ; 
 enough was done if he provided the 
 chamber, the altar and the offerings. 
 The chamber had to be spread with 
 the Kusa, or sacred rushes ; the fire 
 had to be lighted upon the altar ; $ and 
 then the worship commenced. Priests 
 chanted in turn the verses of the 
 Mantras or sacred hymns, which com- 
 bined prayer wjth praise, and invited 
 the presence of -the deities. At the 
 proper moment, when by certain mystic 
 signs the priests knew the god or gods 
 
 * H. H. Wilson, in notes to the Rig- Veda, 
 vol. i. p. 235, note a. 
 
 t See Wilson's " Introduction" to vol. i. p. 
 :xxiv. 
 
 \ It has been questioned whether the fire 
 was not kept burning continually, as in the 
 Persian Fire Temples (Wilson, " Introduc- 
 tion "to vol. i. of Rig- Veda, p. xxiii.) ; but 
 the constant allusions to the production of 
 fire by friction make it clear that, ordinarily, 
 2, fresh fire was kindled. 
 
 invoked to have arrived,* the offer- 
 ings were presented, the divine favor 
 secured, the prayers recited, and the 
 ceremony brought to a close by some 
 participation of the ministering priests 
 in the offerings. 
 
 112. The praises, with which the 
 hymns generally commence, describe 
 the power, the wisdom, the grandeur, 
 the marvelousness, the generosity, 
 the goodness of the deity addressed, 
 adding in some instances encomiums 
 on his -personal beauty f and the 
 splendor of his dress and decora- 
 tions.:!: Occasionally, his great actions 
 are described, either in general terms, 
 or with special reference to certain 
 exploits ascribed to him in the mythol- 
 ogy. When he has been thus ren- 
 dered favorable, and the offerings have 
 been made in the customary way, the 
 character of the hymn changes from 
 praise to prayer, and the god is im- 
 plored to bestow blessings on the 
 person who has instituted the cere- 
 mony, and sometimes, but not so 
 commonly, on the author or reciter of 
 the prayer. It is noticeable that the 
 blessings prayed for are, predomi- 
 nantly, of a temporal and personal de- 
 scription. || The worshiper asks for 
 food, life, strength, health, posterity; 
 for wealth, especially in cattle, horses, 
 and cows ; for happiness ; for protec- 
 tion against enemies, for victory over 
 them, and sometimes tor iheir de- 
 struction, particularly where they are 
 represented as heretics. Protection 
 against evil spirits is also occasionally 
 requested. There is, comparatively 
 speaking, little demand for moral 
 benefits, for discernment, or improve- 
 ment of character, or forgiveness of 
 sin, or repentance, or peace of mind, 
 
 * Haug, " Essays on the Sacred Language, 
 etc., of the Parsees," p. 248. 
 
 t Wilson, " Introduction," vol. i. p. xxiv. 
 See also Mandala i. Sukta 9, 3 ; Sukta 42, 
 10 ; etc. 
 
 J Rig- Veda. vol. i. p. 223. 
 
 This is especially the case in hymns ad- 
 dressed to Indra (Rig- Veda, vol. i. pp. 85-93, 
 I 3 6 ~ I 39i etc.). 
 
 || Wilson, " Introduction" to vol. i. of Rig- 
 Veda, p. xxv. ; Max Miiller, " Chips from a 
 German Workshop," vol. i. p. 27. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [123] 4T, 
 
 or sticiigth to resist temptation. The 
 sense of guilt is slight.* It is only 
 " in some few instances that hatred of 
 untruth and abhorrence of sin are 
 expressed, and a hope uttered that 
 the latter may be repented of or ex- 
 piated." t Still such expressions do 
 occur. They are not wholly wanting, 
 as they are in the utterances of the 
 ancient Egyptians. " Deliver us this 
 day, O gods, from heinous sin," is the 
 concluding petition of one Sukta.$ 
 * May our sin be repented of," is the 
 burden of another. "Absolve us 
 from the sins of our fathers, and from 
 those which we have committed with 
 our own bodies," is the prayer of a 
 third. || " Varuna is merciful, even to 
 him who has committed sin," is the 
 declaration of a fourth. If Now and 
 then we even seem to have before us 
 a broken-hearted penitent, one who 
 truly feels, like David or the Publican, 
 the depth to which he has fallen, and 
 who, " out of the depths," ** cries to 
 God for forgiveness. " Let me not 
 yet, O Varuna, enter into the house of 
 clay," i. e., the grave, says a Veclic 
 worshiper ; ft " have mercy, almighty, 
 have mercy. If I go along trembling, 
 like a cloud driven by the wind, have 
 mercy, almighty, have mercy. Through 
 want of strength, thou strong and 
 bright god, have I gone wrong; have 
 mercy, almighty, have mercy. Thirst 
 caine upon the worshiper though he 
 stood in the midst of the waters ; have 
 mercy, almighty, have mercy. When- 
 ever we men, Varuna, commit an of- 
 fense before the heavenly host, when- 
 ever we break the law through 
 
 * Wilson, 1. s. c. Max Miiller says, on the 
 other hand, that " the consciousness of sin is 
 a prominent, feature in the religion of the 
 Veda" (" Chips," vol. i. p. 41). He means 
 probably, a noticeable feature, not prominen 
 in the sense of its occurring frequently. 
 
 t These are Prof. Wilson's words ; anc 
 they are quite borne out by the text of th 
 Rig-Veda. 
 
 \ Manclala i. Sukta 115, 6. 
 
 Mandala i. Sukta 97. 
 
 H Mandala vii. Sukta 86, 5. 
 
 Tf Mandala vii. Sukta 87, 7. 
 
 ** Psa. cxxx. i. 
 
 tt Max Miiller, " Ancient Sanskrit Litera 
 ture," p. 540. 
 
 houghtlessness ; have mercy, al- 
 mighty, have mercy." 
 
 113. The offerings wherewith the 
 gods were propitiated were either vic- 
 ims or libations. Victims in the 
 early times appear to have been but 
 arely sacrificed ; and the only animals 
 employed seem to have been the horse 
 md the goat.* Libations were of 
 hree kinds ; ghee, or clarified butter,. 
 ioney,t and the expressed and fer- 
 mented juice of the soma plant. The 
 %hee and honey were poured upon the 
 acrificial fire ; the soma juice was pre- 
 sented in ladles \ to the deities in- 
 voked, part sprinkled on the fire, part 
 on the 'Kusa, or sacred grass strewed 
 upon the floor, and the rest in all 
 cases drunk by those who had con- 
 ducted the ceremony. It is thought 
 by some modern critics that the liquor 
 offered to the gods was believed to in- 
 toxicate them, and that the priests 
 took care to intoxicate themselves with 
 the remainder; || but there is scarcely 
 sufficient evidence for these charges. 
 No doubt, the origin of the Soma 
 ceremony must be referred to the ex- 
 hilarating properties of the fermented 
 juice, and to the delight and astonish- 
 ment which the discovery of them ex- 
 cited in simple minds.lT But exhilara- 
 tion is a very different thing from 
 drunkenness ; and, though Orientals 
 do not often draw the distinction, we 
 are scarcely justified in concluding, 
 without better evidence than any 
 which has been adduced as yet, that 
 the Soma ceremony of the Hindoos 
 was in the early ages a mere Baccha- 
 nalian orgy, in which the worshipers 
 intoxicated themselves in honor of 
 approving deities. Exhilaration will 
 sufficiently explain all that is said of 
 the Soma'in the Rig- Veda ; and it is 
 
 * On the sacrifice of these, see Rig- Veda, 
 vol. ii. pp. 112-125. 
 
 t Honey is not common. On its use, see 
 Max Miilfer, " Ancient Sanskrit Literature," 
 pp. 535 and 537. 
 
 t Rig- Veda, Mandala i. Sukta 116, 24. 
 
 Wilson, " Introduction" to vol. i. of Rig- 
 Veda, p. xxiii. 
 
 || Haug ? " Essays on the Sacred Lan- 
 guage, etc., of the Parsees," pp. 247, 248. 
 
 T Wilson, " Introduction," p. xxxvii. 
 
40 [124] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 charitable to suppose that nothing 
 more was aimed at in the Soma cere- 
 mony. 
 
 114. The offerings of praise and 
 sacrifice, and especially the offering 
 of the soma juice, were considered not 
 merely to please the god, who was the 
 object of them, but to lay him under 
 a binding obligation, and almost to 
 compel him to grant the requests of 
 the worshiper. " The mortal who is 
 strenuous in worship," it is said,* " ac- 
 quires an authority " over the object 
 of his religious regards an authority 
 which is so complete that he may even 
 sell the god's favor to another person, 
 in order to enable him to attain the 
 object of his desires. "Who buys 
 tliis -my Indra," says Vamadeva, a 
 Vedic poet,t " with ten milch kine ? 
 When he shall have slain his foes, 
 then let the purchaser give him back 
 to me again ; " which the commenta- 
 tor explains as follows :J "Vamadeva, 
 having by muck praise got Indra into 
 his possession or subjugation, proposes 
 to make a bargain when about to dis- 
 pose of him ; " and so he offers for ten 
 milch kine to hand him over tempo- 
 rarily, apparently to any person who 
 will pay the price, with the proviso 
 that when Indra has subdued the per- 
 son's foes, he is to be returned to the 
 vendor ! 
 
 115. The subject of a future life 
 seems scarcely to have presented it- 
 self with any distinctness to the 
 thoughts of the early Indians. There 
 is not the slightest appearance in the 
 Rig- Veda of a belief in metempsy- 
 chosis, or the transmigration of human 
 souls after death into the bodies of 
 animals. The phenomena of the 
 present world, what they see and hear 
 and feel in it, in the rushing of the 
 wind, the howling of the storm, the 
 flashing of the lightning from cloud 
 to cloud, the splash of the rain, the 
 roar of the swollen rivers, the quick 
 changes from day to night, and from 
 
 night to day, from storm to calm and 
 from calm to storm, from lurid gloom 
 to sunshine and from sunshine to lurid 
 gloom again ; the interesting business 
 of life, the kindling of fire, the light- 
 ing up of the hearth ; the performance 
 of sacrifice ; the work, agricultural, 
 pastoral, or other, to be done during 
 the day, the storing up of food, the ac- 
 quirement of riches, the training of 
 children ; war, the attack of foes, the 
 crash of arms, the flight, the pursuit, 
 the burning of towns, the carrying off 
 of booty these things, and such 
 things as these, so occupy and fill the 
 minds of this primitive race, that they 
 have in general no room for other 
 speculations, no time or thought to de- 
 vote to them. It is only occasionally, 
 in rare instances, that to this or that 
 poet the idea seems to have occurred, 
 " Is this world the whole, or is there 
 a hereafter? Are there such things 
 as happiness and misery beyond the 
 grave ? " Still, the Rig-Veda is not al- 
 together without expressions which 
 seem to indicate a hope of immortality 
 and of future happiness to be enjoyed 
 by the good, nor entirely devoid of 
 phrases which may allude to a place 
 of future punishment for the wicked. 
 " He who gives alms,'* says one poet,* 
 " goes to the highest place in heaven ; 
 he goes to the gods." " Thou, Agni, 
 hast announced heaven to Manu," 
 says another; which is explained to 
 mean, that Agni revealed to Manu 
 the fact, that heaven is to be gained by 
 pious works.t " Pious sacriricers," 
 proclaims a third, % " enjoy a residence 
 in the heaven of Indra ; pious sacrific- 
 ers dwell in the presence of the gods." 
 Conversely, it is said that " Indra 
 casts into the pit those who offer no 
 sacrifice," and that " the wicked, who 
 are false in thought and false in speech, 
 are born for the deep abyss of hell."|j 
 In the following hymn there is, at 
 
 #Mandala iv. Sukta 15, 5. 
 t Ibid. iv. Sukta 24, 10. 
 | Wilson, Rig- Veda, vol. iii. p. 170, note 2. 
 Max Miiller, " Chips from a German 
 Workshop," vol. i. p. 45. 
 
 *Mandala i. Sukta 125, 5. 
 
 t Wilson, " Rig- Veda," vol. i. p. 80, note a. 
 
 \ Ibid. vol. ii. p. 42. 
 
 Mandala i. Sukta 121, 13. 
 
 || Wilson's " Rig-Veda," vol. iii. p. 129, com- 
 pared with Max Miiller ("Chips," vol. i. p. 
 47)- 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [125] 47 
 
 any rate, clear evidence that the early 
 Vedic poets had aspirations after im- 
 mortality : 
 
 " Where there is eternal light, in the world 
 
 where the sun is placed, 
 In that immortal, imperishable world, place 
 
 me, O Soma. 
 
 Where King Vaivaswata reigns, where the 
 
 secret place of heaven is, 
 Where the mighty waters are, there make me 
 
 immortal. 
 
 Where life is free, in the third heaven of 
 
 heavens, 
 "Where the worlds are radiant, there make me 
 
 immortal. 
 
 Where wishes and desires are, where the 
 
 place of the bright sun is, 
 Where there is freedom and delight, there 
 
 make me immortal. 
 
 Where there is happiness and delight, where 
 
 joy and pleasure reside, 
 Where the desires of our heart are attained, 
 
 there make me immortal." * 
 
 1 16. As thus, occasionally, the deep- 
 er problems of human existence were 
 approached, and, as it were, just 
 touched by the Vedic bards, so there 
 were times when some of the more 
 thoughtful among them, not content 
 with the simple and childish polythe- 
 ism that had been the race's first in- 
 stinct, attempted to penetrate further 
 into the mystery of the Divine exist- 
 ence, to inquire into the relations that 
 subsisted among the various gods gen- 
 erally worshiped, and even to search 
 out the origin of all things. " Who has 
 seen," says one, f " the primeval being 
 at the time of his being born, when 
 that which had no essence bore that 
 which had an essence ? Where was 
 the life, the blood, the soul of the 
 world ? Who sent to ask this from the 
 sage that knew it ? Immature in un- 
 derstanding, undiscerning in mind," 
 he goes on to say, " I inquire after 
 those things which are hidden even 
 
 from the gods Ignorant, I 
 
 inquire of the sages who know, who 
 
 *The translation is Prof. Max Miiller's 
 {" Chips," vol. i. p. 46). 
 
 t Wilson's " Rig- Veda," vol. ii. pp. 127, 
 1 28. Compare Max Miiller, " Lectures on 
 the Science of Religion," p. 46. 
 
 is the Only One who upheld the 
 spheres ere they were created?" 
 After a multitude of speculations, he 
 concludes "They call him Indra, 
 Mitra, Varuna, Agni then he is 
 the beautiful-winged heavenly Ga- 
 rutmat : that which is one, the wise, 
 give it many names they c*all it Agni, 
 Yama, Matarisvan." * Another is 
 still bolder, and plunges headlong in- 
 to the deepest vortex of metaphysics. 
 The following is a metrical version of 
 his poem : f 
 
 " A time there was, when nothing that now 
 
 is 
 
 Existed no, nor that which now is not ; 
 There was no sky, there was no firmament. 
 What was it that then covered up and hid 
 Existence ? In what refuge did it lie ? 
 Was water then the deep and vast abyss, 
 The chaos in which all was swallowed up ? 
 There was no Death and therefore naught 
 
 immortal. 
 There was no difference between night and 
 
 day. 
 
 The one alone breathed breathless by itself : 
 Nor has aught else existed ever since. 
 Darkness was spread around ; all things were 
 
 veiled 
 
 In thickest gloom, like ocean without light. 
 The germ that in a husky shell lay hid, 
 Burst into life by its own innate heat. 
 Then first came Love upon it, born of mind, 
 Which the wise men of old have called the 
 
 bond 
 
 'Twixt uncreated and created things. 
 Came this bright ray from heaven, or from 
 
 below ? 
 Female and male appeared, and Nature 
 
 wrought 
 Below, above wrought Will. Who truly 
 
 knows, 
 Who has proclaimed it to us, whence this 
 
 world 
 
 Came into being? The great gods them- 
 selves 
 Were later born. Who knows then whence 
 
 it came ? 
 
 The Overseer, that dwells in highest heaven, 
 He surely knows it, whether He Himself 
 Was, or was not, the maker of the whole, 
 Or shall we say, that even He knows not ? " 
 
 117. This poem, and the other 
 prayers above quoted, are sufficient 
 to show that among the Vedic poets 
 
 * Max Miiller, " Chips from a German 
 Workshop," vol. i. p. 29. 
 
 1 1 have followed as closely as possible the 
 prose translation of Max Miiller, given with 
 an intermixed comment in his " History of An- 
 cient Sanskrit Literature," pp. 559-563. 
 
48 [120] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 there were at any rate some who, by 
 God's grace, had raised themselves 
 above the murky atmosphere in which 
 they were born, had " sought the Lord, 
 and fell after Him," * had struggled 
 out of polytheism into a conscious 
 monotheism, and, although they could 
 not without revelation solve the 
 problem of existence, had gone far to 
 realize the main points of true re- 
 ligion ; the existence of one eternal 
 and perfect Being, the dependence of 
 man on Him, the necessity of men 
 leading holy lives if they would please 
 Him, and the need, which even the 
 best man has, of His mercy and 
 forgiveness. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE RELIGION OF THE PHCENICIANS 
 AND CARTHAGINIANS. 
 
 " Le dieu des Pheniciens, comme de tons 
 Jes pantheismes asiatiques, etait a la fois un 
 et plusieurs." LENORMANT, Manuel d'His- 
 toire Ancienne^ vol. iii. p. 127. 
 
 118. IN discussing the religion of 
 the Phoenicians and Carthaginians, we 
 have to deal with a problem far more 
 difficult than any which has yet oc- 
 cupied us. No " sacred book," like 
 the Rig- Veda, the Zendavesta or the 
 " Ritual of the Dead," here spreads 
 before us its stores of knowledge, re- 
 quiring little more than patient study 
 to yield up to us the secrets which it is 
 the object of our inquiry to discover. 
 No extensive range of sculptures or 
 paintings exhibits to our eyes, as in 
 Assyria, Greece, and Egypt, the out- 
 ward aspect of the worship, the forms 
 of the gods, the modes of approaching 
 them, the general character of the 
 ceremonial. Nor has even any an- 
 cient author, excepting one, treated 
 expressly of the subject in question, 
 or left us anything that can be called 
 in any sense an account of the religion, 
 ft is true that we do possess, in the 
 " Evangelical Preparation " of Euse- 
 bius, a number of -extracts from a 
 
 * Actsxvii. 27. 
 
 Greek writer of the tirst or second 
 century after Christ bearing on the 
 matter, and regarded by some mod- 
 erns * as containing an authentic ex- 
 position of the Phoenician teaching 
 on a number of points, which, if not 
 exactly religion, are at any rate con- 
 nected with religion. But the work 
 of Philo Byblius, from which Eusebius 
 quotes, is so wild, so confused, so un- 
 intelligible, that it is scarcely possible 
 to gather from it, unless by a purely 
 arbitrary method of interpretation,! 
 any distinct views whatsoever. More- 
 over, the work is confined entirely to 
 cosmogony and mythology, two sub- 
 jects which are no doubt included in 
 ''religion," as that term was under- 
 stood in the ancient world, but which 
 lie so much upon its outskirts, and so 
 little touch its inner heart, that even 
 an accurate and consistent exposition 
 would go a very short way toward 
 acquainting us with the real'diamcter 
 of a religious system of which we knew 
 only these portions. Add to this, 
 that it is very doubtful whether Philo 
 of Byblus reported truly what he 
 found in the Phoenician originals which 
 he professed to translate, or did not 
 rather import into them his own phi- 
 losophical notions, and his own theo- 
 ries of the relation borne by the 
 Phoenician theology to that of other 
 countries. 
 
 119. If, upon these grounds, we re- 
 gard the fragments of Philo Byblius 
 as untrustworthy, and as only to be 
 used with the utmost caution, we are 
 reduced to draw our knowledge of 
 the Phoenician and Carthaginian re- 
 ligion from scattered and incidental 
 notices of various kinds from the 
 allusions made to the subject by the 
 writers of portions of the Old Testa- 
 ment, from casual statements occur- 
 ring in classical authors, from inscrip- 
 tions, from the etymology of names, 
 
 * Especially Baron Bunsen. (See " Egypt's 
 Place in Universal History," vol. iii. pp. 162- 
 287.) 
 
 t Bunsen assumes that Philo's work con- 
 tains three cosmogonies, quite distinct, of 
 which the second and third contradict the 
 first. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [127] 49 
 
 and from occasional representations | 
 accompanying inscriptions upon ' 
 stones or coins. Such sources as 
 these " require," as has been well 
 said,* " the greatest care before they 
 can be properly sifted and success- 
 fully fitted together ; " and they con- 
 stitute at best a scanty and unsatis- 
 factory foundation for a portraiture 
 which, to have any value, must be 
 drawn with some sharpness and defi- 
 niteness. 
 
 120. One of the most striking feat- 
 ures of the Phoenician polytheism 
 especially striking when we compare 
 it with the systems which lay geo- 
 graphically the nearest to it, those of 
 Egypt and Assyria is its compara- 
 tive narrowness. If we make a col- 
 lection of the divine names in use 
 either in Phoenicia Proper or in the 
 Phoenician colonies, we shall find 
 that altogether they do not amount to 
 twenty. Baal, Ashtoreth, Melkarth, 
 Moloch, Adonis, Dagon, Eshmun, 
 Hadad, El, Eliun, Baaltis, Onca, Sha- 
 mas, Sadyk, the Kabiri, exhaust 
 pretty nearly the list of the native 
 deities ; and if we add to these the 
 divinities adopted from foreign coun- 
 tries, Tanith, Hammon (= Ammon), 
 and Osir (= Osiris), we shall still find 
 the number of distinct names not to 
 exceed eighteen. This is a small 
 number compared even with the pan- 
 theon of Assyria ; compared with 
 that of Egypt, it is very remarkably 
 scanty. 
 
 121. It may be added that there 
 are grounds for doubting whether 
 even the eighteen names above given 
 were regarded by the Phoenicians 
 themselves as designating really so 
 many deities. We shall find, as we 
 proceed, reason to believe, or to sus- 
 pect, that in more than one case it is 
 the very same deity who is desig- 
 nated by two or more of the sacred 
 names. 
 
 122. The general character of the 
 names themselves is remarkable. A 
 large proportion of them are honor- 
 
 ific titles, only applicable to real per- 
 sons, and indicative of the fact that 
 from the first the Phoenician people, 
 like most other Semitic races, dis- 
 tinctly apprehended the personality 
 of the Supreme Being, and intended 
 to worship, not nature, but God in 
 nature, not planets, or elements, or 
 storm, or cloud, or dawn, or light- 
 ning, but a being or beings above and 
 beyond all these, presiding over them, 
 perhaps, and working through them, 
 but quite distinct from them, possess- 
 ing a real personal character. El 
 signified " the strong," or " the power- 
 ful,"'* and in the cognate Hebrevr 
 took the article, and became ha-El, 
 "the Strong One," He who alone has 
 true strength, and power, and who 
 therefore alone deserves to be called 
 " strong " or " mighty/'' Eliun is 
 "the Exalted," "the" Most High," 
 and is so translated in our author- 
 ized version of Genesis (xiv. 18), 
 where Melchizedek,' King of Salem, 
 the well-known type of our blessed 
 Lord,f is said to have been " the 
 priest of the most High God," which 
 is in the original, " priest of El-Eliun." 
 Again, Sadyk is "the Just," "the 
 Righteous," and is identical with the 
 Zcdek occurring as the second element 
 in Melchizedek, which St. Paul, in 
 the Epistle to the Hebrews (vii. 2), 
 translates by " King of righteousness." 
 Baal is " Lord," or " Master," an 
 equivalent of the Latin dominus, and 
 hence a term which naturally requires 
 another after it, since a lord must be 
 lord of something. Hence in Phoe- 
 nician inscriptions $ we find Baal- 
 Tsur, "Lord of Tyre," Baal-Tsidon, 
 "Lord of Zidon," 'Baal-Tars, "Lord 
 of Tarsus," and the like. Hence also 
 we meet with such words as Baal- 
 berith, " Lord of treaties," Baal-pear* 
 ' Lord of Peor " (a mountain), Baal- 
 zebub, "Lord of flies," and Bed- 
 
 * Max Mliller, " Science of Religion," pp. 
 117-118. 
 
 * Max Miiller, " Science of Religion/' p. 
 177. 
 
 t See Psa. ex. 4 ; Heb. vii. 1-24. 
 
 J Gesenius, " Scripturae Linguaeque Phoe- 
 nicia Monumenta," pp. 96, 277, etc. 
 
 Num. xxv. 3, 5 ; Judg. viii. 33 ; ix. 4 ; 2 
 Kings i. 3, 6. 
 
50 [128] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 samin* " Lord of Heaven." Adonis, 
 or more properly, Adoni, for the S is 
 merely the Greek nominatival ending, 
 has nearly the same meaning as Baal, 
 being the Phoenician equivalent of the 
 Hebrew Adonai, the word ordinarily 
 rendered " Lord " in our version of 
 the Old Testament. Adoni, however, 
 takes no adjunct, since it is most 
 properly translated " my lord," " lord 
 of me," f and thus contains in itself 
 the object of the lordship. Moloch is 
 melck, " king," the initial element in 
 Melchizedek ; and it is this same 
 word which appears a second time, 
 with an adjunct, in Melkarth, which 
 is a contraction of melek-keretk, or 
 rather mdek-qereth,% which means 
 '** king of the city." Baaltis, or Baalti, 
 'is the feminine form of Baal, with the 
 .-suffix found also in Adoni, and has the 
 meaning of " my lady." The Greeks 
 -.expressed the word most commonly 
 Jby BeUis, but occasionally by. Bel- 
 tihes, and, through a confusion of 
 :the kindred labials m and , by Mylit- 
 :ta,|| The Kabiri are "the Great 
 Ones," from kabbir, " great," which 
 ittokts kabbirim in the plural. 
 
 123. It may be suspected, though it 
 <cannot be proved, that these various 
 'names, excepting the last, were origi- 
 nally mere epithets of the One Eter- 
 nal. and Divine Being who was felt to 
 .rule the world, and that, whatever 
 may have been the case elsewhere, 
 the Phoenicians at any rate began 
 with the monotheistic idea, whether 
 that idea originated in the recesses of 
 their own hearts or was impressed 
 tipon them from without by revelation. 
 If El, Eliun, Sadyk, Baa], Adoni, Mo- 
 loch, Melkarth, were all one, may not 
 ,the same have been true of Dagon, 
 Hadad, Eshmun, Shamas, -etc.? nay, 
 may not even the foreign gods, Ham- 
 mon and Osir,;have been understood 
 to be simply additional epithets of the 
 Most High, expressive of his attri- 
 
 * Phil oBybl ius in the-".Fragmenta Histo- 
 .ricorum Grascorum," vbl.'iii.,p. 565. 
 '] Gesenius, p. 400. 
 J Gesenius, p. 96. 
 .Hesych. ad voc. B^%. 
 | Herod, i. 131, 199. 
 
 
 butes of inscrutability and omni- 
 
 c;nVnr^ ? 
 
 science i 
 
 124. A primary objection may 
 seem to lie against this view in the 
 fact that the Phoenicians recognized 
 not only gods, but goddesses, the 
 name Ashtoreth* belonging to the re- 
 ligion from the very earliest time to 
 which we can trace it back, and Baal- 
 tis being placed by the side of Baal, 
 apparently as a distinct and separate 
 personage. But it has been argued 
 that "the original conception of fe- 
 male deities differs among Semitic 
 and Aryan nations," and that the fem- 
 inine forms among the Semites "were 
 at first intended only to express the 
 energy or the collective powers of the 
 deity, not a separate being, least of 
 all a wife." f And this view is con- 
 firmed by passages in ancient inscrip- 
 tions which seem to identify Phoeni- 
 cian gods and goddesses, as one in 
 the inscription of Mesa, which speaks 
 of Chemosh-Ashtar as a single cleity, 
 another in an inscription from Car- 
 thage in which Tanith is called Pen- 
 Baal, or "the face of Baal," and a 
 third, on the tomb of Eshmun azar, 
 King of Sidon, where Ashtoreth her- 
 self is termed Shem-Baal, " the name 
 of Baal." If Ashtoreth and Tanith 
 were merely aspects of Baal, if the 
 Phoenician Supreme God was "and- 
 rogynous," || the fact that the religious 
 system of the people admitted god- 
 desses as well as gods, will not mili- 
 tate against its original monotheism. 
 
 125. A more vital objection may be 
 taken from the two names, Eshmun 
 and Kabiri. The Kabiri were the 
 sons of Sadyk ; they were seven in 
 
 * Baal and Ashtoreth appear first distinctly 
 as Phoenician gods in i Kings xi. 5 ; but we 
 may suspect that they bear the same charac- 
 ter where they are mentioned in Judges ii. 13 ; 
 x. 6. They appear as Syrian gods in the hi- 
 eroglyphical inscriptions as early as Rameses 
 II. (about r..c. 1350). 
 
 t Max Muller, " Science of Religion," p. 
 183. 
 
 } De Vogue in the "Journal Asiatique "for 
 1867, p. 138. 
 
 Max Muller, "Science of Religion," p. 
 184. 
 
 y " Speaker's Commentary," vol. i. p. 732. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [129] 51 
 
 number;* they were actual deities, 
 the special gods of sailors ; images of 
 them adorned the prows of vessels. 
 And Eshmun, the name of their 
 brother, is a word signifying "eight," 
 or the " eighth." It seems clear from 
 this that the Phoenicians ultimately 
 recognized at least eight gods ; aiid if 
 so, we must pronounce them polythe- 
 ists. 
 
 126. At any rate, whether or no 
 they were polytheists from the first, 
 it cannot be doubted that they be- 
 came such. When the Carthaginian 
 introduced by Plautus into his " Pce- 
 nulus " commences his speech f with 
 the Words " Yth alonim v'alonuth sic- 
 carthi," which Plautus rightly renders 
 by " Deos deasque veneror," or, " I 
 worship the gods and goddesses," he 
 expresses a genuine Phoenician senti- 
 ment. Baal and Ashtoreth, if origi- 
 nally one, were soon divided, were 
 represented under different forms, and 
 were worshiped separately. El, El- 
 iun, Sadyk, Adonis, Melkarth, drifted 
 off from their original moorings, and 
 became distinct and separate gods, 
 sometimes with a local character.! 
 Dagon,. Eshmun, Shamas, had perhaps 
 been distinct from their first introduc- 
 tion, as had been the Kabiri, and per- 
 haps some others. Thus a small pan- 
 theon was formed, amounting, even 
 including the Kabiri, to no more than 
 about fifteen or twenty divinities. 
 
 127. At the head of all clearly stood 
 Baal and Ashtoreth, the great male 
 and the great female principles. Baal, 
 " the Lord " par excellence, was perhaps 
 sometimes and in some places taken 
 to be the sun; but this was certainly 
 hot the predominant idea of any pe- 
 riod ; and it maybe questioned whether 
 in the original seats of the nation it 
 was ever entertained until after the 
 Roman conquest. As Bel in Baby- 
 lonia was completely distinct from 
 
 Shamas,* so was Baal in Phoenicia.! 
 The Greeks rendered Bel and Baal, 
 not by Apollo, but by Zeus ; $ and 
 their rendering was approved by Philo 
 Byblius, who, if a Greek by extrac- 
 tion, was well versed in Phoenician 
 lore, and a native of Byblus, a Phoeni- 
 cian town. Baal seems really to have 
 been the Supreme God. His chief ti- 
 tles were Baal-shamayin, "the Lord 
 of heaven," Baal-berith, " the Lord of. 
 treaties," corresponding to the Grecian 
 " Zeus Orkios," and Belithan, \ " the 
 aged Lord," with which we may com- 
 pare the Biblical phrase, "the An- 
 cient of days." IT He was also 
 known in Numidia as " the eternal 
 king." ** Baal was the god to whom 
 we may almost say that most Phoeni- 
 cians were consecrated soon after 
 their birth, the names given to them 
 being in almost a majority of cases 
 compounded with Baal or Bal.f t Ded- 
 icatory inscriptions are in general ad- 
 dressed to him, either singly, %\ or in 
 conjunction with a goddess, who is 
 most usually Tanith. Not unfre- 
 quently he is addressed as Baal-Ham-, 
 mon, or Baal in the character of the 
 Egyptian god Ammon,|||| with whom 
 he is thus identified, not unnaturally, 
 since Ammon too was recognized as 
 the Supreme God, and addressed as 
 Zeus or Jupiter. IT If 
 
 128. Ashtoreth, or Astarte, is a 
 word whereof no satisfactoiy account 
 has as yet been given. It seems to 
 have no Semitic derivation, and may 
 perhaps have been adopted by the 
 
 * " Philo Byblius," c. 5, 8 ; Damascius 
 ap. Phot. " Bibliothec." p. 573. 
 
 t Plaut. " Poenul." Act v. I. 
 
 .J Moloch became the special god of the 
 Ammonites ; Hadad, of the Syrians.' 
 
 See Gesenius, " Scrip. Phoenic. Mon.," 
 pi. 21. 
 
 * See above, p. 52-57. 
 
 t The separate worship of Shamas, or the 
 Sun, appears in 2 Kings xxiii. 5, and in Gese- 
 nius, p. 119. 
 
 J Herod, i. 181 ; Diod. Sic. ii. 9. 
 
 Philo Bybi., c. iv. 14. ' 
 
 || Damasc. ap. Phot. " Bibliothec." cod. 
 ccxlii. p. 559. 
 
 IT Dan. vii. 9, 13. 
 
 ** Gesenius, pp. 197, 202, 205. 
 
 It Eth-baal (i Kings xvi. 31), Merbal (Her- 
 od, vii. 98), Hannibal, Hasdrubal, Adherbal, 
 Maharbal, are well-known instances. 
 
 JJ Gesenius, " Script. Phcen. Mon.," Nos. 3, 
 4, 49, 51, etc. 
 
 Ibid. Nos. 46, 47, 48, and 50. 
 
 || !| Ibid. p. 172. 
 
 TS" Herod, ii. 42 ; Diod. Sic. i. 13 ; 
 '" De Isid. et Osir," s. 9. 
 
[130] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 Semites from an earlier Hamitic 
 population. Originally a mere name 
 for the energy or activity of God, 
 Ashtoreth came to be regarded by 
 the Phoenicians as a real female per- 
 sonage, a supreme goddess, on a par 
 -with Baal,* though scarcely wor- 
 shiped so generally. In the native 
 mythology she was the daughter of 
 Uranos (heaven), and the wife of El, 
 or Saturn. t The especial place of her 
 .worship in Phoenicia was Sidon.J In 
 one of her aspects she represented 
 the moon, and bore the head of a 
 heifer with horns curving in a cres- 
 cent form, whence she seems to 
 have been sometimes called Ashto- 
 reth KarnaimJ or, " Astarte of the 
 two horns." But, more commonly, 
 she was a nature goddess, "the great 
 mother," the representation of the 
 female principle in nature, and hence 
 presiding over the sexual relation, 
 and connected more or less with love 
 and with voluptuousness. The 
 Greeks regarded their Aphrodite, and 
 the Romans their Venus, as her equiv- 
 alent. One of her titles was " Queen 
 of Heaven : " and under this title she 
 was often worshiped by the Israel- 
 ites.H 
 
 129. Melkarth has been regarded by 
 .some writers as " only another form 
 of Baal." ** But he seems to have as 
 good a claim to a distinct personality 
 as any Phoenician deity after Ash- 
 toreth and Baal. The Greeks and 
 Romans, who make Baal equivalent 
 to their Zeus or Jupiter, always iden- 
 tify Melkarth with Hercules ;tt and in 
 a bilingual inscription, $$ set up by 
 two natives of Tyre, this identifica- 
 
 * See the inscription in Gesenius' collec- 
 tion, numbered Si (pi. 47), where Baal and 
 Ashtoreth are joined together. Compare 
 Judg. ii. 13 ; x. 6. 
 
 t'PhilcTBybl. c. iv. 12. 
 
 t See i Kings xi. 5, 33, and compare the 
 inscription of Eshmunazar. 
 
 Philo Byblius, c. v. I. 
 
 || Gen. xiv. 5. 
 
 1[ Jer. vii. 18 ; xliv. 25. 
 
 ** Kenrick, " Phoenicia," p. 322. 
 
 ft Herod, ii. 44 ; Philo Bybl. c. iv. 19, 
 etc. 
 
 Jt This inscription is given by Gesenius 
 (pi. 6). 
 
 tion is endorsed and accepted. When 
 Melkarth is qualified as baal-Tsur, 
 "baal of Tyre," it is not meant that 
 he was the Tyrian form of the god 
 Baal, but that he was the special 
 tutelary " lord " of the great Phoeni- 
 cian city. The word Melkarth, as 
 already explained, means "king of- 
 the city," and the city intended was 
 originally Tyre, though Melkarth 
 would seem to have been in course of 
 time regarded as a god of cities gen- 
 erally ; and thus he was worshiped 
 at Carthage, at Heraclea in Sicily, at 
 Amathus in Cyprus, at Gades in 
 Spain, and elsewhere.* In Numidia t 
 he had the title of "great lord ; " but 
 otherwise there is little in the Phoeni- 
 cian monuments to define his attri- 
 butes or fix his character. We must 
 suppose that the Greeks traced in 
 them certain resemblances to their 
 own conception of Hercules ; but it 
 may be doubtful whether the resem- 
 blances were not rather fanciful than 
 real. 
 
 130. That Dagon was a Phoenician 
 god appears from many passages in 
 the fragments of Philo Byblius. $ 
 though the Israelites would seem to 
 have regarded him as a special Philis- 
 tine deity. There are indications, || 
 however, of his worship having been 
 spread widely through Western Asia 
 in very early times ; and its primitive 
 source is scarcely within the range of 
 conjecture. According to the general 
 idea, the Phoenician Dagon was a 
 
 * See the inscriptions in Gesenius (pis. 14, 
 16, 17) : and the coins of Heraclea (pi. 38), 
 of Gades (pi. 40), and of Sextus (ibid.} in the 
 same. On Amathus, see Hesychius and voc. 
 Malicha. 
 
 t Gesenius, pi. 27, No. 65. 
 
 \ Especially c. iv. 2, 6, 15. 
 
 Judg. xvi. 23 ; i Sam. v. 2-5 ; I Chron. 
 x. 10. 
 
 || Berosus speaks of an early Babylonian 
 god as bearing the name of O-dacon, \vhich 
 is, perhaps, Dagon with a prefix. Dagon is 
 an element in the name of a primitive Chal- 
 dzcan monarch, which is read as Ismi-Dagon. 
 Asshur-izir-pal couples Dagon with Ann in. 
 his inscriptions, and represents himself an 
 equally the votary of both. Da-gan is also 
 found in' the Assyrian remains as an epithet 
 of Belus. (See the Author's " Ancient 
 Monarchies," vol. i. p. 614 ; 2d edition.) 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [131] 03 
 
 Fish-god,* having the form described 
 by Berosus, and represented so often 
 in the Assyrian sculptures " a form 
 resembling that of a fish, but with a 
 human head growing below the fish's, 
 and with human feet gro wing along- 
 side of the fish's tail and coming out 
 from it."f Fish are common em- 
 blems upon the Phoenician coins ; $ 
 and the word Dagon is possibly de- 
 rived from dag, " a fish," so that the 
 temptation to identify the deity with 
 the striking form revealed to us by 
 the Ninevite sculptures is no doubt 
 considerable. It ought, however, to 
 be borne in mind that there is nothing 
 in the Scriptural description of the 
 Philistine Dagon to suggest the idea 
 that the image which fell on its face 
 before the ark of the covenant had in 
 any respect the form of a fish. Nor 
 do the Assyrian monuments connect 
 the name of Dagon, which they cer- 
 tainly contain, (I with the Fish-deity 
 whose image they present. That 
 deity is Nin or Nintis.lf Altogether, 
 therefore, it must be pronounced ex- 
 ceedingly doubtful whether the popu- 
 lar idea has any truth at all in 
 it ; or whether we ought not to revert 
 to the view put forward by Philo,** 
 that the Phoenician Dagon was a 
 " corn-god," and presided over agri- 
 culture. 
 
 131. Adonis, or Tammuz, which 
 was probably his true name,ft was a 
 god especially worshiped at Byblus. 
 He seems to have represented nature 
 
 * See Kenrick, " Phoenicia," p. 323 ; Lay- 
 ard, " Nineveh and Babylon," p. 343 ; 
 " Speaker's Commentary," vol. ii. p. 201, etc. 
 
 t Beros. Fr. i. 3. 
 
 t Geseniu>, "Script. Phcen. Monumenta," 
 pis. 40 and 41. 
 
 There is nothing in the original corre- 
 sponding to " the fishy part," which is given 
 in the margin of the Authorized Version. 
 The actual words are, " only Dagon was left 
 to him." The meaning is obscure. 
 
 |[ Sir II. Rawlinson in the Author's " He- 
 rodotus," vol. i. p. 614 : 3d edition. 
 
 If Ibid. p. 642. 
 
 ** Philo Bybl. c. iv. 2 : Aoy^v, cq ia-l 
 STW:;. Compare 13, where Dagon is said 
 to have discovered corn and invented the 
 plow, whence he was regarded by the Greeks 
 as equivalent to their Zeus Arotrios. 
 
 *"\ Gesenius, " Script. Phoen. Mon." p. 400. 
 
 in its alternate decline and revival, 
 whence the myth spoke of his death 
 and restoration to life; the river of 
 Byblus was regarded as annually red- 
 dened with his blood; and once a 
 year, at the time of the summer sol- 
 stice, the women of Phoenicia and 
 Syria generally " wept for Tammuz." * 
 Extravagant sorrow was followed after 
 an interval by wild rejoicings in honor 
 of his restoration to life ; and the ex- 
 citement attendant on these alterna- 
 tions of joy and woe led on by almost 
 necessary consequence, with a people 
 of such a temperament as the Syrians, 
 to unbridled license and excess. The 
 rites of Aphaca, where Adonis ha.d 
 his chief temple, were openly immoral, 
 and when they were finally put down, 
 exhibited every species of abomina- 
 tion characteristic of the worst forms 
 of heathenism. f 
 
 132. El, whom Philo Byblius iden- 
 tifies with Kronos,^ or Saturn, is a 
 shadowy god compared with those 
 hitherto described. In the mythol- 
 ogy he was the child of heaven atid 
 earth, the brother of Dagon, and the 
 father of a son whom he sacrificed. 
 His actual worship by the Phoenicians 
 is not very well attested, but may be 
 regarded as indicated by such names 
 as Hanni-el, Kaclml (= Kadmi-el), 
 Enyl (= Eni-el) and the like.|| He is 
 said to have been identified with the 
 planet Saturn by the Phoenicians ; TT 
 and this may be true of the later form 
 of the religion, though El originally 
 can scarcely have been anything but 
 a name of the Supreme God. It cor- 
 responded beyond a doubt to II, in 
 the system of the Babylonians, who 
 
 * Ezek. viii. 14. 
 
 t Euseb. " Vit. Constantin. Magn." iii. 
 55. Compare Kenrick, " Phoenicia," vol. i. 
 p. 311. 
 
 \ Philo Bybl. c. iv. 2 :' lUov rov ml Kp6- 
 vov. Compare 10 and 21. 
 
 Philo Bybl. c. iv. 3. 
 
 || Hanni-el occurs in a Phoenician inscrip- 
 tion (Gesen. p. 133). Cadmil is given as one 
 of the Kabiri by the Scholiast on Apollonius 
 Rhodius (i. 917). Enyl is mentioned as a 
 king of Byblus by Arrian (" Exp. Alex." ii. 
 20). 
 
 TJ Philo Bybl. 1. s. c. 
 
[132] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 was the head of the pantheon,* and 
 the special god of Babel, or Baby- 
 lon, which is expressed by Bab-il, 
 "the gate of II," in the inscriptions.! 
 133. That Shamas, or Shemesh, " the 
 sun," was worshiped separately from 
 Baal has been already mentioned. In 
 Assyria and Babylonia he was one of 
 the foremost deities.;- J -and his cult 
 among the Phoenicians is witnessed 
 by such a name as Abed-Shemesh, 
 which is found in two of the native 
 inscriptions^ Abed-She.mesh means 
 " servant of Shemesh," as Obadiah 
 means " servant of Jehovah," and Ab- 
 dallah " servant of Allah " ; and is an 
 unmistakable evidence of the worship 
 
 , of Shemesh by the people who em- 
 ployed it as the parallel names are 
 of the worship, respectively, of Jeho- 
 
 , vah and Allah, by Jews and Moham- 
 medans. The sun-worship of the 
 
 I Phoenicians seems to have been ac- 
 companied by a use of " sun -im- 
 ages," || of which we have perhaps a 
 specimen on a votive tablet found 
 in Numidia,^" although the tablet it- 
 self is dedicated to Baal. There was 
 also connected with it a dedication to 
 the sun-god of chariots and horses, to 
 
 1 which a quasi-divine character at- 
 tached,** so that certain persons were 
 from their birth consecrated to the 
 sacred horses, and given by their par- 
 ents the name of Abed-Susim, " serv- 
 ant of the horses," as we find by an 
 inscription from Cyprus.ft It may be 
 suspected that the Haclad or Hadar 
 of the Syrians $ was a variant name 
 of Shamas, perhaps connected with 
 adir, " glorious," and if so, with the 
 
 epharvite gad, Adrammelech.* Ad- 
 >dus, according to Philo Byblius, was 
 n a certain sense "kingVw^) of 
 he gods." 
 
 134. These latter considerations 
 nake it doubtful whether the Moloch 
 r Molech, who was the chief divinity 
 f the Ammonites,! and of whose 
 vorship by the Phoenicians there are 
 ertain indications,! is to be viewed 
 as a separate and substantive god, or 
 as a form of some other, as of Shamas, 
 r of Baal, or of Melkarth, or even of 
 1. Molech meaning simply " king " 
 s a term that can naturally be ap- 
 plied to any " great god," and which 
 nay equally well designate each of 
 he four deities just mentioned. 
 Rites like those of Molech belonged 
 certainly to El and to Baal ; and 
 he name may be an abbreviation of 
 Melkarth, || or a title the proper title 
 of Shamas. The fact that Philo 
 las a Melich, whom he makes a dis- 
 inct deity,1F is of no great importance, 
 since it is clear that he multiplies the 
 Phoenician gods unnecessarily ; and 
 .noreover, by explaining Melich as 
 equivalent to Zeus Meilichios, he 
 tends to identify him with Baal.** 
 Upon the whole, Moloch seems 
 scarcely entitled to be viewed as a 
 distinct Phoenician deity. The word 
 A r as perhaps not a proper name in 
 Plusnicia, but retained its appellative 
 force, and may have applied to more 
 than one deity. 
 
 135. A similarly indefinite char- 
 acter attaches to the Phoenician Ba- 
 altis. Beltis was in Babylonian my- 
 
 * See above, p. 47. 
 
 t Sir H. Rawlinson in the Author's " He- 
 
 PP 
 
 rodotus," vol. i. p. 613. 
 
 \ The Author's " Herodotus," vol. i. 
 631-634. 
 
 Gesenius, " Script. Phcen. Mon." pi. 9. 
 
 H This is given in the margin of 2 Chron 
 xiv. 5 and xxxiv. 4, as the proper translator 
 of khammanim^ which seem certainly to 
 have been images of some kind or other. 
 
 IF Gesenius, "Script. Phoen. Mon." pi. 21. 
 
 ** See 2 Kings xxiii, n. 
 
 tt Gesenius, p, 130, and pi. n, No. 9. 
 
 tj Found under the form of Adodus it 
 Philo Byblius (c. v. i 
 
 * 2 King xvii. 31. 
 
 t See i Kings xi. 7. 
 
 \ The names Bar-melek, Abed-melek, and 
 Melek-itten, which occur in Phcen ician in- 
 scriptions (Gesenius, pp. 105, 130, 135), im- 
 ply a god who has either the proper name of 
 Moloch, or is worshiped as " the king." 
 
 Diod. Sic. xx. 14; Porphyr. "De Ab- 
 stinentia," ii. 56; Gesen. "Script. Phcen. 
 Mon." p. 153. 
 
 II Melkarth is frequently abbreviated in the 
 Phoenician inscriptions, and becomes Mel- 
 kar, Mokarth, and even Mokar. Hesychius 
 says that at Amathus Hercules \vas called 
 Malika, 
 
 J Philo Bybl. c. iii. 9. 
 
 ** Since he calls Baal Zeus Belus (c. iv. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [133] 55 
 
 thology a real substantive goddess, 
 quite distinct and separate from Ish- 
 tar, Gula, and Zirbanit;* but Baallis 
 in Phoenicia had no such marked 
 character. We hear of no temples of 
 Baaltis; of no city where she was 
 specially worshiped.! The word 
 does not even occur as an element in 
 Phoenician proper names, and if in 
 use at all as a sacred name among 
 the Phoenicians, must almost cer- 
 tainly have been a mere epithet of 
 Ashtoreth,t who was in reality the 
 sole native goddess. Lydus expressly 
 states that Blatta, which is (like 
 Mylitta) a corruption of Baalti, was 
 " a name given to Venus by the Phoe- 
 nicians." 
 
 136. Saclyk again, whom we have 
 meiuioned as a distinct deity on the 
 strength of statements in Philo Byb- 
 lius and Damascius, j| scarcely ap- 
 pears as a separate object of worship, 
 either in Phoenicia or elsewhere. 
 The nearest approach to such an ap- 
 pearance is furnished by the names 
 Melchi-zeclek, and Adoni-zedek,1T 
 which may admit of the renderings, 
 " Sadyk is my king/' " Saclyk is my 
 lord." Sadyk has not been found as 
 an element in any purely Phoenician 
 name ; much less is there any distinct 
 recognition of him as a god upon any 
 Phoenician monument. We are told 
 that he was the father of Eshmun and 
 the Kabiri ; ** and as they were cer- 
 tainly Phoenician gods we must per- 
 haps accept Sadyk as also included 
 among their deities. From his name 
 we may conclude that he was a per- 
 sonification of the Divine Justice. 
 
 137. Eshmun is, next to Baal, 
 Ashtoreth, and Melkarth, the most 
 clearly marked and distinct presen- 
 tation of a separate deity that the 
 
 Phoenician remains set before us. 
 He was the especial god of Berytus 
 \\Bdnii)* and had characteristics 
 | which attached to no other deity. 
 Why the Greeks should have identi- 
 fied him with their Asclepias or 
 ^Escuiapius,t is not clear. He was 
 the youngest son of Sadyk, and was a 
 youth of great beauty, with whom 
 Ashtoreth fell in love, as she hunted 
 in the Phoenician forests. The fable 
 relates how, being frustrated in her 
 designs, she afterward changed him 
 into a god, and transported him from 
 earth to heaven. % Thenceforth he 
 was worshiped by the Phoenicians 
 almost as much as Baal and Ashto- 
 reth themselves. His name became 
 a frequent element in the Phoenician 
 proper names ; and his cult was 
 taken to Cyprus, to Carthage, and to 
 Other distant colonies. 
 
 138. With Eshmun must be placed 
 the Kabiri, who in the mythology 
 were his brothers, || though not born 
 of the same mother.lT It is doubtful 
 whether the Kabiri are to be regarded 
 as originally Phoenician, or as adopt- 
 ed into the religion of the nation 
 from without. The word appears to 
 be Semitic ; ** but the ideas which 
 attach to it seem to belong to a wide- 
 spread superstition, ft whereby the 
 discovery of fire and the original work- 
 ing in metals were ascribed to strong, 
 misshapen, and generally dwarfish 
 
 * See above, p. 61. 
 
 t Philo makes her a " queen of Byblus " 
 (c. v. 5), but says nothing of her worship 
 there. 
 
 J See Kenrick's " Phoenicia," p. 301. 
 
 " De Mensibus," i. 19. 
 
 I) Philo Byblius, c. iii. 13; c. iv. 16; 
 etc. Damasc. ap. Phot. " JJibliothec." p. 
 
 IT See Gen. xiv. 18, and Josh. x. i. 
 
 ** Philo Byblius, c. iii. 14 5 c. iv. 16. 
 
 *See Darnascius ap. Phot. " liibliothec." 
 
 ' t This is done by Philo of Byblus (c. v. 8), 
 by Damascius (1. s, c.), by Strabo (xviL 14), 
 and others. 
 
 \ Damascius, -1, s. c. 
 
 Eshmun-azar, whose tomb has beew 
 found at Sidon, is the best known instance; 
 but the Phoenician inscriptions give also 
 Bar-Eshmun, Han-Eshmun, Netsib-Eshrnutj, 
 Abed-Eshmun, Eshmun-itten and others. 
 (See Gesenius, ''Script. Phoen. Mon.".p. 
 136.) 
 
 11 Damascius, 1. s. c. ; Philo Byblius, c. v. 
 8. 
 
 T Philo Bybl. c. iv, 16. 
 
 ** See above, p. 150. Mr. Kenrick ques- 
 tions the derivation from kabbir (" Egypt of 
 Herodotus," p. 287) ; but almost all other 
 writers allow it. 
 
 ft See Mr. Kenrick's " Notes on the Ca- 
 biri," in the work above mentioned, pp. 264- 
 287. 
 
56 [134] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 deities, like Phthah in Egypt, Hepha- 
 istos and the Cyclopes in Greece, 
 ' ; Gav the blacksmith " in Persia, and 
 the gnomes in the Scandinavian and 
 Teutonic mythologies. According to 
 Philo Byblius * and Damascius,t 
 {he Phoenician Kabiri were seven in 
 number, and according to the Scho- 
 liast on Apollonius Rhodius,$ the 
 names of four of them were Axierus, 
 Axiokersus, Axiokersa, and Cadmilus 
 or Casmilus. Figures supposed to 
 represent them, or some of them, are 
 found upon Phoenician coins, as espe- 
 cially on those of Cossura, which are 
 exceedingly curious. The Kabiri 
 were said to have invented ships ; || 
 and it is reasonable to regard them 
 as represented by the Pataeci of 
 Herodotus,1[ which were pigmy fig- 
 ures placed by the Phoenicians on the 
 prows of their war-galleys, no doubt 
 as tutelary divinities. The Greeks 
 'compared the Kabiri with their own 
 Castor and Pollux, who like them 
 presided over navigation.** 
 
 Besides their original and native 
 deities, the Phoenicians acknowledged 
 some whom they had certainly intro- 
 duced into their system from an ex- 
 ternal source, as Osiris, Ammon, and 
 Tariith. The worship of Osiris is 
 represented on the coins of Gaulos,tt 
 which was an early Phoenician settle- 
 ment ; and " Osir " (=Osiris) occurs 
 not unfrequently as an element in 
 Phoenician names, $-t where it occupies 
 the exact place elsewhere assigned 
 to Baal, Melkarth, and Ashtoreth. 
 Ammon is found under the form 
 Hammon in votive tablets, but does 
 not occur independently ; it is al- 
 ways attached as an epithet to Baal. 
 
 * Philo Bvblius, c. v. 8. 
 
 t Damascius, 1. s. c. 
 
 t Schol. ad Apoll. Rhod. " Argonautica," 
 i. 915. 
 
 See Gesenius, " Script. Phoen. Mon." pi. 
 39. 
 
 || Philo Byblius, c. iii. 14. 
 
 T[ Herod, iii. 37. 
 
 ** Horat. " Od." i. 3, 2 ; iii. 29, 64. 
 
 tt Gesenius, pi. 40, A. 
 
 J| Ibid. pp. 96, no, 130, etc. 
 
 Ibid. pp. 108, 1 68, 174, i7> J 77> and 
 Davis, " Carthage and her Remains," pi. opp. 
 p. 256. 
 
 Whether it determines the aspect of 
 Baal to that of a " sun-god " may be 
 questioned,* since the original idea 
 of Ammon was as far as possible re- 
 mote from that of a solar deity.t 
 But, at any rate, the constant connec- 
 tion shows that the two gods were 
 not really viewed as distinct, but that 
 in the opinion of the Phoenicians 
 their own Baal corresponded to the 
 Ammon of the Egyptians, both alike 
 representing the Supreme Being. 
 Tanith has an important place in a 
 number of the inscriptions, being 
 given precedence over Baal himself. $ 
 She was worshiped at Carthage, in 
 Cyprus, by the Phoenician settlers 
 at Athens |j and elsewhere ; but we 
 have no proof of her being acknowl- 
 edged in Phoenicia itself. The name 
 is connected by Gesenius with that of 
 the Egyptian goddess Neith,1T or 
 Net ; but it seems rather to represent 
 the Persian Tanata, who was known 
 as Tanaitis or Tanai's, and also as 
 Anaitis or Aneitis to the Greeks. 
 Whether there was, or was not, a re- 
 mote and original connection be- 
 tween the goddesses Neith and Ta- 
 nata is perhaps open to question ; 
 but the form of the name Tanith, or 
 Tanath,** shows that the Phoenicians 
 adopted their goddess, not from 
 Egypt, but from Persia. With re- 
 gard to the character and attributes 
 of Tanath, it can only be said that, 
 while in most respects she corre- 
 sponded closely with Ashtoreth, whom 
 she seems to have replaced at Car- 
 thage, she had to a certain extent a 
 more elevated and a severer aspect. 
 The Greeks compared her not only 
 
 * This was the opinion of Gesenius 
 ("Script. Phosn. Mon." p. 170); but his 
 arguments upon the point are not convincing. 
 
 t See above, p. 19. 
 
 \ See Gesenius, pp. 168, 174, 175, 177; 
 Davis, " Carthage and her Remains," 1. s. c. 
 
 Gesenius, p. 151. Compare p. 146, 
 where the true reading is possibly Abed- 
 Tanith. 
 
 || Ibid. p. 113. 
 
 1 Ibid. pp. 117, 118. 
 
 ** " Tanath "is the natural rendering of the 
 Phoenician word, rather than " Tanith," and 
 is preferred by some writers. (See Davis, 
 "Carthage and her Remains/' pp. 274-276.) 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [135] 57 
 
 to their Aphrodite, but also to their 
 Artemis,* 1 the huntress-deity, whose 
 noble form is known to us from many 
 pure and exquisite statues. It may 
 be suspected that the Carthaginians, 
 dwelling in the rough and warlike 
 Africa, revolted against the softness 
 and effeminacy of the old Phoenician 
 cult, and substituted Tanath for Ash- 
 toreth, to accentuate their protest 
 against religious sensualism.! 
 
 140. It seems to be certain that in 
 Phoenicia itself, and in the adjacent 
 parts of Syria, the worship of Ash- 
 toreth was from the first accompanied 
 with licentious rites. As at Baby- 
 lon, $ so in Phoenicia and Syria at 
 Byblus, at Ascalon, at Aphaca, at 
 Hierapolis the cult of the great 
 Nature-goddess a tended to encourage 
 dissoluteness in the relations between 
 the sexes, and even to sanctify im- 
 purities of the most abominable de- 
 scription." || Even in Africa, where 
 an original severity of morals had 
 prevailed, and Tanith had been wor- 
 shiped " as a virgin with martial attri- 
 butes," and with " severe, not licen- 
 tious, rites," 1F corruption gradually 
 crept in ; and by the time of Augus- 
 tine ** the Carthaginian worship of 
 the " celestial goddess " was charac- 
 terized by the same impurity as that 
 of A'ihtoreth in Phoenicia and Syria. 
 
 141. Another fearful blot on the 
 religion of the Phoenicians, and one 
 which belongs to Carthage quite as 
 much as to the mother-country,! t is 
 
 * In a bilingual inscription given by 
 Gesenius, the Phoenician Abed-Tanath be- 
 comes in the Greek " Artemidorus." Anaitis 
 or Tanata is often called " the Persian Arte- 
 mis." (See Plutarch, "Vit. Lucull." p. 24; 
 Bochart, " Geographia Sacra," iv. 19; Pausan. 
 iii. 16, 6, etc.) 
 
 t See Davis's " Carthage," p. 264; Hunter, 
 " Religion des Karthager," c. 6. 
 
 J Herod, i. 199. 
 
 Herod, i. 105 ; Lucian, " De Dea Syra," c. 
 ix. ; Euseb. "Vit. Constantin. Magni," iii. 55. 
 
 || Twistleton, in Smith's "Dictionary of 
 the Bible," vol. ii. p. 866. 
 
 IT Kenrick, " Phoenicia," p. 305. 
 
 ** Augustine, " De Civitate Dei," 5i. 4. 
 
 tt See Diod. Sic. xx. 14, 65 ; Justin, xviii. 
 6; Sil. Ital. iv. 765-768; Dionys. Hal. i. 38; 
 etc. Compare Gesenius, " Script. Phocn. 
 Mon." pp. 448,449,453; and Davis, " Car- 
 thage," pp. 296, 297. 
 
 the systematic offering of human vic- 
 tims, as expiatory sacrifices, to El and 
 other gods. The ground of this hor- 
 rible superstition is to be found in 
 the words addressed by Balak to Ba- 
 laam * " Wherewith shall I come be- 
 fore the Lord, and bow myself before 
 the high God ? Shall I come before 
 Him with burnt offerings, with calves 
 of a year old? Will the Lord be 
 pleased with thousands of rams, or 
 with ten thousands of rivers of oil? 
 Shall I give my firstborn for my trans- 
 gression, the fruit of my body for the 
 sin of my soul?" As Philo Byblius 
 expresses it,f " It was customary 
 among the ancients, in times of great 
 calamity and danger, that the rulers 
 of the city or nation should offer up 
 the best beloved of their children, as 
 an expiatory sacrifice to the aveng- 
 ing deities : and these victims were 
 slaughtered mystically." The Phoe- 
 nicians were taught that, once upon a 
 time, the god El himself, under the 
 pressure of extraordinary peril, had 
 taken his only son, adorned him with 
 royal attire, placed him as a victim 
 upon an altar, and slain him with his 
 own hand. Thenceforth, it could not 
 but be the duty of rulers to follow the 
 divine example set them ; and even 
 private individuals, when beset by 
 difficulties, might naturally apply the 
 lesson to themselves, and offer up 
 their children to appease the divine 
 anger. We have only too copious ev- 
 idence that both procedures were in 
 vogue among the Phoenicians. Por- 
 phyry declares? that the Phoenician 
 history was full of instances, in which 
 that people, when suffering under 
 great calamity from war, or pestilence, 
 or drought, chose by public vote one'of 
 those most dear to them, and sacri- 
 ficed him to Saturn." Two hundred 
 noble youths were offered on a single 
 occasion at Carthage, after the victory 
 of Agathocles. Hamilcar, it is possi- 
 ble, offered himself as a victim on the 
 
 * Micah vi. 6, 7. 
 t Philo Bybl., c. vi. 3. 
 | " De Abstinentia," ii. 56. 
 Lactant. " Inst." i. 21, quoting Pescen- 
 nius Festus. 
 
58 [136] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD, 
 
 entire defeat of his army by Gelo. : * 
 When Tyre found itself unable to re- 
 sist the assault of Alexander the 
 Great, the proposition was made, but 
 overruled, to sacrifice a boy to Sat- 
 urn, f Every year, at Carthage, there 
 was at least one occasion, on which 
 human victims, chosen by lot, were 
 publicly offered to expiate the sins of 
 the nation. $ 
 
 142. And private sacrifices of this 
 sort went hand in hand with public 
 ones. Diodorus tells us, that in the 
 temple of Saturn at Carthage, the 
 brazen image of the god stood with 
 outstretched hands to receive the 
 bodies of children offered to it. 
 Mothers brought their infants in their 
 arms ; and, as any manifestation of 
 reluctance would have made the sac- 
 rifice unacceptable to the god, stilled 
 them by their caresses till the mo- 
 ment when they were handed over to 
 the image, which was so contrived as 
 to consign whatever it received to a 
 glowing furnace underneath it. In- 
 scriptions found at Carthage record 
 the offering of such sacrifices. || 
 They continued even after the Roman 
 conquest ; and at length the procon- 
 sul Tiberius, in order to put down 
 the practice, hanged the priests of 
 these bloody rites on the trees of their 
 own sacred grove. If The public ex- 
 hibitions of the sacrifice thenceforth 
 ceased, but in secret they still contin- 
 ued down to the time of Tertullian.** 
 
 143. The Phoenicians were not idol- 
 aters, in the ordinary sense of the word ; 
 that is to say, they did not worship 
 images of their deities. In the tem- 
 ple of Melkarth at Gades there was 
 no material emblem of the god at all, 
 with the exception of an ever-burning 
 fire, ff Elsewhere, conical stones, 
 
 * See the story in Herodotus (vii. 167). 
 
 t Quint. Curt. " Vit. Alex. Magn." iv. 15. 
 
 j Silius Ital. iv. 765-768. 
 
 Diod. Sic. xx. 14. 
 
 || Gesenius, " Script. Phoen. Mon.," pp. 
 448, 449. An inscription given by Dr. Davis 
 (" Carthage and her Remains," pp. 296, 297) 
 refers to the public annual sacrifice. 
 
 I Tertull. " Apologia/' c. ix. 
 
 ** Ibid. 
 
 \ t Silius Ital. ii. 45. 
 
 called batyli, were dedicated to the 
 various deities,* and received a cer- 
 tain qualified worship, being regarded 
 as possessed of a certain mystic virt- 
 ue, f These stones seem occasion- 
 ally to have been replaced by pillars, 
 which were set up in front of the tem- 
 ples, and had sacrifices offered to 
 them.i The pillars might be of 
 metal, of stone, or of wood, but were 
 most commonly of the last named 
 material, and were called by the Jews 
 asherahs, " uprights." , At festive 
 seasons they seem to have been 
 adorned with boughs of trees, flowers, 
 and ribbons, and to have formed the 
 central object of a worship which was 
 of a sensual and debasing character. 
 An emblem common in the Assyrian 
 sculptures is thought to give a good 
 idea of the ordinary appearance on 
 such occasions of these asherahs. 
 
 144. Worship was conducted publicly 
 in the mode usual in ancient times, and 
 comprised praise, prayer and sacrifice. 
 The* victims offered were ordinarily 
 animals, || though, as already shown, 
 human sacrifices were not infrequent. 
 It was usual to consume the vic- 
 tims entirely upon the altars. ^[ Liba- 
 ations of wine were copiously poured 
 forth in honor of the chief deities,** 
 and incense was burnt in lavish pro- 
 
 * Philo Bybl. c. iv. 2 ; Damasc. ap Phot. 
 " Bibliothec." p. 1065; Hesych. ad voc. 
 TicurvAog. It has been proposed to explain 
 the word btztulus as equivalent to Beth-el, 
 " House of God," and to regard the Phoeni- 
 cians s believing that a deity dwelt in the 
 stone. (Kenrick, " Phoenicia," p. 323, note 
 
 t The original batuli were perhaps aero- 
 liths, which were regarded as divine, since 
 they had fallen from the sky. 
 
 \ Philo Byblius, c. iii. "7- On the pillar- 
 worship of the Phoenicians, see Bunsen, 
 " Egypt's Place in Univ. History," vol. iv. pp. 
 208-212. 
 
 Asherah is commonly translated by 
 "grove" in the Authorized Version; but 
 its true character has been pointed out by 
 many critics. (See " Speaker's Commen- 
 tary," vol. i. pp. 416, 417 ; " Ancient Mon- 
 archies," vol. ii. p. 8 ; 2cl edition.) 
 
 || Lucian, " De Dea Syra," 49. 
 
 If Gesenius, " Script. Phosn. Mon." pp. 446, 
 447 ; Movers, " Das Opferwesen der Kartha- 
 ger," p. 71, etc. 
 
 ** Philo Bybl. c. iv. i. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [137] 59 
 
 fusion.* Occasionally an attempt 
 was made to influence the deity in- 
 voked by loud and prolonged cries, 
 and even by self-inflicted wounds and 
 mutilation. f Frequent festivals were 
 held, especially one at the vernal equi- 
 nox, when sacrifices were made on 
 the largest scale, and a vast concourse 
 of persons was gathered together at 
 the chief temples. $ Altogether the 
 religion of the Phoenicians, while 
 possessing some redeeming points, 
 as the absence of images and deep 
 sense of sin which led them to sacri- 
 fice what was nearest and dearest to 
 them to appease the divine anger, 
 must be regarded as one of the lowest 
 and most debasing of the forms of 
 belief and worship prevalent in the 
 ancient world, combining as it did 
 impurity with cruelty, the sanction of 
 licentiousness with the requirement of 
 bloody rites, revolting to the con- 
 science, and destructive of any right 
 apprehension of the true idea of God. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE RELIGION OF THE ETRUSCANS. 
 
 " Hetrusci, religione imbuti." Cic. De Div. 
 1.42. 
 
 145. THE religion of the Etrus- 
 cans, or Tuscans, like that of the 
 Phoenicians and Carthaginians, is 
 known to us chiefly from the notices 
 of it which have come down ,to us 
 in the works of the classical writ- 
 ers, Greek and Latin. It has, how- 
 ever, the advantage of being illustrated 
 more copiously than the Phoenician by 
 monuments and other works of art 
 found in the country, the productions 
 of native artists works which in 
 some respects give us a considerable 
 insight into its inner character. On 
 the other hand, but little light is 
 thrown upon it by the Etruscan in- 
 
 * Virg. "^En."i. 415. 
 
 t i King xviii. 26, 28 ; Lucian, " De Dea 
 Syra," 50 ; Plutarch, " De Superstitione," 
 p. 170,0. 
 
 J Lucian, " De Dea Syra," 49. 
 
 criptions, partly because these inscrip- 
 tions are almost all of a single type, 
 being short legends upon . tombs, 
 partly from the fact that the Etruscan 
 language has defied all the efforts 
 made to interpret it, and still remains, 
 for the most part, an insoluble, or at 
 any rate an unsolved, problem. We 
 are thus without any genuine Etrus- 
 can statements of their own views 
 upon religious subjects, and are 
 forced to rely mainly upon the re- 
 ports of foreigners, who looked upon 
 the system only from without, and 
 are not likely to'have fully understood 
 it. It is a further disadvantage that 
 our informants write at a time when 
 the Etruscans had long ceased to be 
 a nation, and when the people, hav- 
 ing been subjected for centuries to 
 foreign influences, had in all proba- 
 bility modified their religious views 
 in many important points. 
 
 146. There seems to be no doubt 
 that their religion, whatever it was, 
 occupied a leading position in the 
 thoughts and feelings of the Etruscan 
 nation. " With Etruria," says a mod- 
 ern writer, " religion was an all-per- 
 vading principle the very atmosphere 
 of her existence a leaven operating 
 on the entire mass of society, a con- 
 stant pressure ever felt in one form 
 or other, a power admitting no rival, 
 all-ruling, all-regulating, all-requir- 
 ing.* Livy calls the Etruscans " a 
 race which, inasmuch as it excelled 
 in the art of religious observances, 
 was more devoted to them than any 
 other nation." f Arnobius says that 
 Etruria was " the creator and par- 
 ent of superstition."! The very 
 name of the nation, Tusci, was de- 
 rived by some from a root, thuein^ 
 "to sacrifice," or "make offerings 
 to the gods " as if that were the 
 chief occupation of the people. 
 While famous among the nations of 
 
 * Dennis, " Cities and Cemeteries of Etru- 
 ria," vol. i. Introduction, p. xlix. 
 
 t " Gens ante omnes alias eo magis dedita 
 religionibus, quod excelleret arte colendi 
 eas," Liv. v. i. 
 
 \ Arnob. " Adv. Genres," vii. 
 
 Servius, " Comment, in Virg. ^n." x. 1. 
 257. 
 
60 [138] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 antiquity for their art, their commerce, 
 and their warlike qualities, the Etrus- 
 cans were above all else celebrated 
 for their devotion to their religion, 
 and for " the zeal and scrupulous 
 care with which they practiced the 
 various observances of its rites and 
 ceremonies." * 
 
 147. The objects of worship were 
 twofold, including (i) Deities proper, 
 and (2) the Lares, or ancestral spirits 
 of each family. The deities proper 
 may be divided into three classes : 
 first, those whose sphere was the 
 heaven, or some portion of it ; sec- 
 ondly, those who belonged more 
 properly to earth; and thirdly, those 
 of the infernal regions, or nether 
 world, which held a prominent place 
 in the system, and was almost as much 
 in the thoughts of the people as their 
 " Amend " was in the thoughts of the 
 Egyptians. f 
 
 148. The chief deities of the 
 Heaven were the following five : Tina, 
 or Tinia, Cupra, Menrva, Usil and 
 Losna. Tina, or Tinia, whd was rec- 
 ognized as the chief god,$ and whom 
 the Greeks compared to their Zeus, 
 and the Romans to their Jupiter, 
 seems to have been originally the 
 heaven itself, considered in its en- 
 tirety, and thus corresponded both in 
 name and nature to the Tien of the 
 Chinese, with whom it may be sus- 
 pected that the Etruscans had some 
 ethnic affinity. Tina is said to have 
 had a special temple dedicated to his 
 honor in every Etruscan city, and in 
 every such city one of the gates bore 
 his name. He appears to have been 
 sometimes worshiped under the ap- 
 pellation of Summanus, which perhaps 
 meant "the supreme god."|| We 
 must not, however, take this term as 
 indicative of a latent monotheism, 
 whereof there is no trace in the Etrus- 
 
 * Smith, " Dictionary of Greek and Roman 
 Geography," vol. i. p. 865. 
 
 t See above, p. 33. 
 
 t Dennis, " Cities and Cemeteries," vol. i. 
 " Introduction," p. i ; Taylor, " Etruscan 
 Researches," p. 132. 
 
 Servius, " Comment m Virg. ^En." i. 422. 
 
 il Max Miiller, " Science of Religion," p. 
 376. 
 
 can religion, but only as a title of 
 honor, or at most as a recognition of 
 a superiority in rank and dignity on 
 the part of this god, who was primus 
 inter pares, the presiding spirit in a 
 conclave of equals. 
 
 149. Next to Tina came Cupra, a 
 goddess, who appears to have also 
 borne the name of Thalna orThana.* 
 The Greeks compared her to their 
 Hera, and the Romans to their Juno, 
 or sometimes to their Diana, who was 
 originally the same deity. Like Tina, 
 Cupra had a temple in every Etruscan 
 city, and a gate named after her.f It 
 is thought by some that she was a 
 personification of light, or day ; $ but 
 this is uncertain. Her name, Thana, 
 looks like a mere variant of Tina, and 
 would seem to make her a mere fem- 
 inine form of the sky-god, his comple- 
 ment and counterpart, standing to him 
 as Amente to Ammon in the Egyp- 
 tian, or as Luna to Lunus in the 
 Roman mythology. A similar rela- 
 tion is found to have subsisted be- 
 tween the two chief deities of the 
 Etruscan nether world. 
 
 150. The third among the celestial 
 deities was Menrva, or Menrfa, out of 
 whom the Romans made their Mi- 
 nerva. She enjoyed the same privi- 
 leges in the Etruscan cities as Tina 
 and Cupra, having her own temple 
 and her own gate in each of them. 
 Mr. Isaac Taylor believes that origin- 
 ally she represented the half light of 
 the morning and evening, and even 
 ventures to suggest that her name 
 signified " the red heaven," and re- 
 ferred to the flush of the sky at dawn 
 and sunset. || A slight confirmation 
 is afforded to this view by the fact 
 that we sometimes find two Menrvas 
 represented in a single Etruscan work 
 of art. IF But we scarcely possess suf- 
 ficient materials for determining the 
 
 *The name Cupra is known to us only 
 from Strabo ("Geograph." v. p. 241). 
 Thalna is found on Etruscan monuments. 
 
 t Servius,.!. s. c. 
 
 J Gerhard, " Gottheiten der Etrusker," p. 
 40; Taylor, "Etruscan Researches," p. 142. 
 
 Servius, 1. s. c. 
 
 || " Etruscan Researches," p. 137. 
 
 TF/^.p. 138. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [130] 61 
 
 real original character of this deity. 1 
 It was probably foreign influence that 
 brought her ultimately into that close 
 resemblance which she bears to Mi- 
 nerva and Athene' on the mirrors and 
 vases, where she is represented as 
 armed and bearing the aegis.* 
 
 151. Usil and Losna, whom we have 
 ventured to join with Tina, Cupra, 
 and Menrva as celestial deities, ap- 
 pear to nave been simply the Sun and 
 the Moon, objects of worship to so 
 many ancient nations. Usil was 
 identified with the Greek Apollo 
 (called Aplu by the Etruscans), and 
 was represented as a youth with bow 
 and arrows. f Losna had the cres- 
 cent for her emblem, $ and was fig- 
 ured nearly as Diana by the Romans. 
 
 152. Next to Usil and Losna may 
 be placed in a group the three ele- 
 mental gods, Sethlans, the god of fire, 
 identified by the Etruscans themselves 
 with the Greek Hephaistos and the 
 Latin Vulcan ; Nethuns, the water- 
 god, probably the same as Neptunus ; 
 and Phuphlans, the god of earth and 
 all earth's products, who is well com- 
 pared with Dionysus and Bacchus. || 
 Phuphlans was the special deity of 
 Pupluna, or (as the Romans called it) 
 Populonia.^l He seems to have been 
 called also Vortumnus or Volturntis ;** 
 and in this aspect he had a female 
 counterpart, Voltumna, whose temple 
 was the place of meeting where the 
 princes of Etruria discussed the af- 
 fairs of the Confederation. tt 
 
 153. Another group of three con- 
 sists of Turan, Thesan, and Turms, 
 native Etruscan deities, as it would 
 seem, corresponding more or less 
 closely to the Aphrodite, Eos, and 
 
 * Dennis, "Cities and Cemeteries," vol. i. 
 Introduction, p. li. 
 
 t Taylor, "Etruscan Researches," p. 143. 
 
 J Lanzi, " Saggio della Lingua Etrusca," 
 vol. ii. p. 76. 
 
 Dennis, " Cities and Cemeteries," vol. i. 
 Introduction, p. liv. 
 
 H Taylor, " Etruscan Researches," p. 141 ; 
 Smith, " Diet, of Greek and Rom. Antiqui- 
 ties," vol. i. p. 865. 
 
 'IT Dennis, " Cities and Cemeteries," vol. ii. 
 p. 242. 
 
 ** Ibid. vol. i. Introduction, p. liii. 
 
 Jt Liv. iv. 23, 61 ; v. 17, etc. 
 
 Hermes of the Greeks, and the Ve- 
 nus, Aurora, and Mercurius of the 
 Romans. Of these Turan is the most 
 frequently found, but chiefly in sub- 
 jects taken from the Greek mythol- 
 ogy, while Thesan occurs the 'least 
 often. According to one view, the 
 name Turms is the mere Etruscan 
 mode of writing the Greek word 
 Hermes,* the true native name having 
 been Camillus or Kamil.t It does 
 not appear that any of these three 
 gods was much worshiped by the 
 Etruscans. They figured in the my- 
 thology, but lay almost outside tlie 
 religion. 
 
 154. The main character in which 
 the gods of heaven and earth were 
 recognized by the Etruscans was that 
 of rulers, signifying, and sometimes 
 executing, their will by means of thun- 
 der and lightning. Nine great gods, 
 known as the Novensiles, were be- 
 lieved to have the power of hurling 
 thunderbolts, and were therefore held 
 in special honor.$ Of these nine, 
 Tinia, Cupra, Menrva, and Sethlans, 
 were undoubtedly four. Summanus 
 and Vejovis, who are sometimes 
 spoken of as thundering gods, seem 
 to be mere names or aspects of 
 Tinia. The Etruscans recognized 
 twelve sorts of thunderbolts, and 
 ascribed, we are told, to Tinia three 
 of them. || 
 
 155. But it was to the unseen world 
 beneath the earth, the place to which 
 men went after death, and where the 
 souls of their ancestors resided, that 
 the Etruscans devoted the chief por- 
 tion of their religious thought ; and 
 with this were connected the bulk of 
 their religious observances. Over 
 the dark realms of the dead ruled 
 Mantus and Mania, king and queen 
 of Hades, the former represented as 
 an old man, wearing a crown, and 
 with wings on his shoulders, and bear- 
 
 * Taylor, "Etruscan Researches," p. 149. 
 
 t So' Callimachus ap. Serv. in Virg. yEn. 
 xi. 1. 543. 
 
 \ Varro, " De Ling. Lat." v. 74 ; Plin. " H. 
 N." ii. 53; Manilius ap. Arnob. "Adv. 
 Gentes," iii. 38. 
 
 Plin. 1. s. c. ; Amm. Marc. xvii. 10, 2. 
 
 ll Senec. " Nat. Quasst." ii. 41. 
 
62 [140] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 ing in his hands sometimes a torch, 
 sometimes two or three large nails, 
 which are thought to indicate " the in- 
 evitable character of his decrees."* 
 Intimately connected with these dei- 
 ties, their prime minister and most 
 active agent, cruel, hideous, half hu- 
 man, half animal, the chief figure in 
 almost all the representations of the 
 lower world, is the demon, Charun, in 
 name no doubt indentical with the 
 Stygian ferryman of the Greeks, but 
 in character so different that it has 
 even been maintained that there is no 
 analogy between them.t Charun is 
 " generally represented as a squalid 
 and hideous old man with flaming 
 eyes and savage aspect ; but he has, 
 moreover, the ears, and often the 
 tusks of a brute," with (sometimes) 
 " negro features and complexion, and 
 frequently wings," $ so that he " an- 
 swers well, cloven feet excepted, to 
 the modern conception of the devil." 
 His brow is sometimes bound round 
 by snakes ; at other times he has a 
 snake twisted round his arm ; and he 
 bears in his hands almost universally 
 a huge mallet or hammer, upraised, 
 as if he were about to deal a death- 
 stroke. When death is being inflicted 
 by man, he stands by, " grinning with 
 savage delight ; " when he comes 
 naturally, he is almost as well pleased ; 
 he holds the horse on which the de- 
 parted soul is to take its journey to 
 the other world, bids the spirit mount, 
 leads away the horse by the bridle or 
 drives it before him, and thus con- 
 ducts the deceased into the grim 
 kingdom of the dead.|| In that king- 
 dom he is one of the tormentors of 
 guilty souls, whom he strikes with his 
 mallet, or with a sword, while they 
 kneel before him and implore for 
 mercy. Various attendant demons 
 and furies, some male, some, female, 
 
 * Dennis, "Cities and Cemeteries," vol. i. 
 Introduction, p. Ivi. 
 
 :tAmbrosch, " De Charonte Etrusco," 
 quoted by Dennis, vol. ii. p. 206. 
 
 t Dennis, " Cities and Cemeteries," vol. ii. 
 p. 206. 
 
 Ibid. p. 207. 
 
 H Dennis, " Cities and Cemeteries," pp. 193, 
 194. 
 
 seem to act under his orders, and in- 
 flict such tortures as he is pleased to 
 prescribe. 
 
 156. It must be supposed that the 
 Etruscan conceived of a judgment 
 after death, of an apportionment of 
 rewards and punishments according 
 to desert.* But it is curious that the 
 representations in the tombs give no 
 clear evidence of any judicial process, 
 containing nothing analogous to the 
 Osiricl trial, the weighing of the soul, 
 the sentence, and the award accord- 
 ingly, which are so conspicuous on the 
 monuments of Egypt. Good and evil 
 spirits seem to contend for the pos- 
 session of souls in the nether world ; 
 furies pursue some, and threaten them 
 or torment them ; good genii protect 
 others and save them from the dark 
 demons, who would fain drag them 
 to the place of punishment.t Souls 
 are represented in a state which seems 
 to be intended for one of ideal happi- 
 ness, banqueting, or hunting, or play- 
 ing at games, and otherwise enjoying 
 themselves : $ but the grounds of the 
 two different conditions in which the 
 departed spirits exist are not clearly 
 set forth, and it is analogy rather than 
 strict evidence which leads us to the 
 conclusion that desert is the ground 
 on which the happiness and misery 
 are distributed. 
 
 157. Besides Charun and his name- 
 less attendant demons and furies, the 
 Etruscan remains give evidence of a 
 belief in a certain small number of 
 genii, or spirits, having definite names, 
 and a more or less distinct and pecul- 
 iar character. One of the most 
 clearly marked of these is Vanth, or 
 Death, who appears in several of the 
 sepulchral scenes, either standing by 
 the door of an open tomb, or prompt- 
 ing the slaughter of a prisoner, or 
 otherwise encouraging carnage and 
 destruction. Another is Kulmu, 
 
 * So Dennis and others ; but there is a want 
 of distinct evidence upon the point. 
 
 t Dennis, " Cities and Cemeteries," vol. ii. 
 pp. 193-198. 
 
 \ Dennis, " Cities and Cemeteries," vol. i. 
 pp. 444-446- 
 
 Taylor, " Etruscan Researches," pp. 106- 
 102. (For the scenes referred to, see Micali, 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [141] 63 
 
 "god of the tomb," who bears the 
 fatal shears in one hand and a 
 funeral torch in the other, and opens 
 the door of the sepulchre that it may 
 receive into it a fresh inmate.* A 
 third being of the same class is 
 Nathuns, a sort of male fury, rep- 
 resented with tusk-like fangs and 
 hair standing on end, while in either 
 hand he grasps a serpent by the 
 middle, which he shakes over 
 avengers, in order to excite them to 
 the highest pitch of frenzy, f 
 
 158. In their worship the Etrus- 
 cans sought, first of all and especially, 
 to know the will of the gods, which 
 they believed to.be signified to man 
 in three principal ways. These were 
 thunder and lightning, which they 
 ascribed to the direct action of the 
 heavenly powers ; the flight of birds, 
 which they supposed to be subject to 
 divine guidance ; and certain appear- 
 ances in the entrails of victims 
 offered in sacrifice, which they also 
 regarded as supernaturally induced or 
 influenced. To interpret these indi- 
 cations of the divine will, it was nec- 
 essary to have a class of persons 
 trained in the traditional knowledge 
 of the signs in question, and skilled to 
 give a right explanation of them to 
 all inquirers. Hence the position of 
 the priesthood in Etruria, which was 
 " an all-dominant hierarchy, maintain- 
 ing its sway by an arrogant exclusive 
 claim to intimate acquaintance with 
 the will of heaven, and the decrees of 
 fate." $ The Etruscan priests were 
 not, like the Egyptian, the teachers of 
 the people, the inculcators of a high 
 morality, or the expounders of esoter- 
 ic doctrines on the subjects of man's 
 relation to God, his true aim in life, 
 and his ultimate destiny ; they were 
 soothsaj'ers, who sought to expound 
 
 " Monument! Inediti," pi. Ix. ; and Des 
 Vergers, " L'Etrurie et les Etrusques," pi. 
 xxi.). * Ibid. p. 94. 
 
 t Taylor, " Etruscan Researches," p. 112. 
 
 \ Dennis, " Cities and Cemeteries," vol. i. 
 Introduction, p. xxxix. 
 
 Cic. " De Divinatione," i. p. 41, 42 ; 
 Senec. " Nat. Onaest." ii. 32 ; Diod. Sic. v..p. 
 316 ; Dior.ys. Hal, ix. p. 563 ; Aulus Cell. iv. 
 5 ; Lucan, >f Phars." i. i, 587, etc. 
 
 the future, immediate or remote, to 
 warn men against coming dangers, to 
 suggest modes of averting the divine 
 anger, and thus to save men from 
 evils which would otherwise have 
 come upon them unawares and ruined 
 or, at any rate, greatly injured them. 
 Men were taught to observe the signs 
 in the sky, and the appearance and 
 flight of birds, the sounds which they 
 uttered, their position at the time, 
 and various other particulars ; they 
 were bidden to note whatever came 
 in their way that seemed to them un- 
 usual or abnormal, and to report all 
 to the priests, who thereupon pro- 
 nounced what the signs observed por- 
 tended, and either announced an in- 
 evitable doom,* or prescribed a mode 
 whereby the doom might be postponed 
 or averted. Sometimes the signs re- 
 ported were declared to affect merely 
 individuals ; but frequently the word 
 went forth that danger was portended 
 to the state ; and then it was for the 
 priesthood to determine at once the 
 nature and extent of the danger, and 
 also the measures to be adopted under 
 the circumstances. Sacrifices on a 
 vast scale or of an unusual character 
 were commonly commanded in such 
 cases, even human victims being oc- 
 casionally offered to the infernal dei- 
 ties, Mantus and Mania, t whose 
 wrath it was impossible to appease in 
 any less fearful way. Certain books 
 in the possession of the hierarchy, 
 ascribed to a half divine, half human 
 personage, named Tages,$ and hand- 
 ed down from a remote antiquity, con- 
 tained the system of divination winch 
 the priests followed, and guided them 
 
 * The Etruscans recognized a power of 
 F"ate, superior to the great gods themselves, 
 Tinia and the others, residing in certain " I)i 
 Involuti," or " Di Superiores," who were 
 the rulers of both gods and men (Senec. 
 " Nat. Qucest." ii.4i). 
 
 t Especially to Mania (Macrob. " Satur- 
 nalia," i. 7). Human sacrifices are thought 
 to be represented in the Etruscan remains 
 (Dennis, "Cities and Cemeteries," vol. ii. pp. 
 190, 191). 
 
 . t Lydus, "De Ostentis," 27 ; Cic. " De 
 Div." ii. 23 ; Ovid. "Metamorph." xv. 553- 
 559, etc. 
 
6,4 [142] THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 in their expositions and require- 
 'ments. 
 
 159. Among sacrificial animals 
 were included the bull, the ass, and 
 perhaps the wolf,* though this is dis- 
 puted. The victim, brought by an 
 individual citizen, was always offered 
 by a priest, and libations usually 
 accompanied the sacrifice. Unbloody 
 offerings were also not unfrequently 
 presented, and were burnt upon the 
 altar, like the victims. f 
 
 160. A general survey of the Etrus- 
 can remains has convinced the most 
 recent inquirers, that the public wor- 
 ship of the gods in the temples, 
 which were to be found in all Etrus- 
 can cities, by sacrifice, libation, and 
 adoration, played but a very small 
 part in the religious life, of the nation. 
 " The true temples of the Etruscans," 
 it has been observed, " were their 
 tombs." $ Practically, the real ob- 
 jects of their worship were the Lares, 
 or spirits of their ancestors. Each 
 house probably had its lararium^ 
 where the master of the household 
 offeree* prayer and worship every 
 morning, and sacrifice occasionally. || 
 And each family certainly had its 
 family tomb, constructed on the model 
 of a house, in which the spirits of its 
 ancestors were regarded as residing. 
 " The tombs themselves," we are 
 told, " are exact imitations of the 
 house. There is usually an outer 
 vestibule., apparently appropriated to 
 the annual funeral feast : from this a 
 passage leads to a large central cham- 
 ber, which is lighted by windows cut 
 through the rock. The central hall 
 
 * Dennis, " Cities and Cemeteries,"' vol. 
 ii. pp. 189, 190. 
 
 f Dennis, "Cities and Cemeteries," vol. 
 ii. p. 191. 
 
 J Taylor, " Etruscan' Researches," p. 40. 
 
 On the Roman lararium, which is be- 
 lieved to have been adopted from the Etrus- 
 cans, see an article in Dr. Smith's "Diction- 
 ary of Greek and Roman Antiquities," pp. 
 667, 668, 2d edition. 
 
 |j In the Theodosian Code it was provided 
 that no one should any longer worship his 
 tar with fire (" nullus 'Larem igne venere- 
 tur"), or, in other words, continue to sacri- 
 fice to him. (See Keightley's "Mythology," 
 p. 470.) 
 
 is surrounded by smaller chambers, in 
 which the dead repose. On the roof 
 we see carved in stone the broad 
 beam, or roof-tree, with rafters imi- 
 tated in relief on either side, and even 
 imitations of the tiles. These .cham- 
 bers contain the corpses, and are 
 furnished with all the implements, 
 ornaments, and utensils used in life. 
 The tombs are, in fact, places for the 
 dead to live in. The position and 
 surroundings of the deceased are 
 made to approximate as closely as 
 possible to the conditions of life. 
 The couches on which the corpses 
 repose have a triclinial arrangement, 
 and are furnished with cushions 
 carved in stone ; and imitations of 
 easy-chairs and footstools are care- 
 fully hewn out of the rock. Every- 
 thing, in short, is arranged as if the 
 dead were reclining at a banquet in- 
 their accustomed dwellings. On the 
 floor stand wine-jars ; and the most 
 precious belongings of the deceased 
 arms, ornaments, and mirrors? 
 hang from the roof, or are suspended 
 on the walls. The walls themselves 
 are richly decorated, usually being 
 painted with representations of festive 
 scenes ; we see figures in gayly-em- 
 broidered garments reclining on 
 couches, while attendants replenish 
 the goblets, or beat time to the music 
 of the pipers. Nothing is omitted 
 which can conduce to the amusement 
 or comfort of the deceased. Their 
 spirits were evidently believed to in- 
 habit these house-tombs after death,, 
 just as in life they inhabited their 
 houses." 
 
 161. The tombs were not perma- 
 nently closed. Once a year at least,., 
 perhaps 'Oftener, it was customary for 
 t,he surviving relatives to visit the 
 resting-place of their departed dear, 
 ones, to carry them offerings as tokens 
 of affectionate regard, and solicit their 
 favor and protection. The presents 
 brought included portrait-statues, cups, 
 dishes, lamps, armor, vases, mirrors, 
 gems, seals, and jewelry.f Inscrip. 
 
 * Taylor, " Etruscan Researches," pp. 46- 
 48- 
 
 \ Ibid. pp. 271, 306, etc. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [143] 65 
 
 tions frequently accompanied the offer- 
 ings ; and these show that the gifts 
 were made, not to the spirit of the 
 tomb, or to the infernal gods, or 
 to any other deities, but to the per- 
 sons whose remains were deposited in 
 tiie sepulchres.* Their spirits were 
 no -doubt regarded as conciliated by 
 the presents ; and, practically, it is 
 probable that far more value was at- 
 tached to the fostering care of these 
 nearly allied protectors than to the 
 favor of the awful gods of earth and 
 heaven, who were distant beings, 
 dimly apprehended, and chiefly known 
 as wielders of thunderbolts. 
 
 162. As a whole, the Etruscan re- 
 ligion must be pronounced one of the 
 least elevating of the forms of ancient 
 belief. It presented the gods mainly 
 under a severe and forbidding aspect, 
 as beings to be dreaded and propiti- 
 ated, rather than loved and wor- 
 shiped. It encouraged a supersti- 
 tious regard for omens and portents, 
 which filled the mind with foolish 
 alarms, and distracted men from the 
 performance of the duties of every-day 
 life. It fostered the pride and vanity 
 of the priestly class by attributing to 
 them superhuman wisdom, and some- 
 thing like infallibility, while it demor- 
 alized the people by forcing them to 
 cringe before a selfish and arrogant 
 hierarchy. If it diminished the nat- 
 ural tendency of men to overvalue the 
 affairs of this transitory life, by placing 
 prominently before them the certainty 
 and importance of the life beyond the 
 grave, yet its influence was debasing 
 rather than elevating, from the coarse- 
 ness of the representations which it 
 gave alike of the happiness and misery 
 of the future state. Where the idea 
 entertained of the good man's final 
 bliss makes it consist in feasting and 
 carousing,! and the suffering of the 
 
 * Without accepting all Mr. Taylor's ren- 
 derings of the funereal inscriptions I am of 
 opinion that he has succeeded in establishing 
 this point. 
 
 t See Dennis, " Cities and Cemeteries," vol. 
 i. p. 294 : " They (the Etruscans) believed in 
 the materiality of the soul ; and their Elysium 
 was but a glorification of the present' state 
 of existence : the same pursuits, amusements, 
 
 | lost arises from the blows and wounds 
 I inflicted by demons, the doctrine of 
 future rewards and punishments loses 
 much of its natural force, and is more 
 likely to vitiate than to improve the 
 moral character. The accounts which 
 we have of the morality of the Etrus- 
 cans are far from favorable ;* and it 
 may be questioned whether the vices 
 whereto they were prone did not -re- 
 ceive a stimulus, rather than a check, 
 from their religion. 
 
 CHAFFER 
 
 RELIGION OF THE ANCIENT GREEKS. 
 
 " The Greek religion was the result of the 
 peculiar development and history of the Gre- 
 j cian people." DoLLiNUEK,/ew'a</ Gentile, 
 ' vol. i. p. 6S. 
 
 163. THAT "in general the Greek 
 religion may be correctly described 
 as a worship of Nature ; and that most 
 of its deities corresponded either to 
 certain parts of the sensible world, or 
 to certain classes of objects compre- 
 hended under abstract notions," is a 
 remark of Bishop Thirlwallf in which 
 most critics at the present day will ac- 
 quiesce with readiness. Placed in a re- 
 gion of marked beauty and variety, and 
 sympathizing strongly with the material 
 world around him, the lively Greek 
 saw in the objects with which he was 
 brought into contact, no inert mass of 
 dull arid lifeless matter, but a crowd 
 of might}' agencies, full of a wonder- 
 ful energy. The teeming earth, the 
 quickening sun, the restless sea, the 
 irresistible storm, every display of su- 
 
 and pleasures they had relished in this life 
 they expected in the next, but divested of 
 their sting, and enhanced by increased capaci- 
 ties of enjoyment. To celebrate the great 
 event, to us "so solemn (i.e., death), by feast- 
 j ing and joviality, was not with them unbe-^ 
 ! coming. They knew not how to conceive or 
 I represent a glorified existence otherwise than 
 i bv means of the highest sensual enjoyment." 
 I (Compare pp. 443-448.) 
 
 * See the Author's ' Origin of Nations " 
 i (No. 25, HUMBOLDT LIBRARY). 
 i t " History of Greece," vol. i. p. 217. 
 
66 [144] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 perhtiman might which he beheld, nay, 
 all motion and growth, impressed him 
 with the sense of something living and 
 working. He did not, however, like 
 his Indian brother, deify (as a general 
 rule) the objects themselves ; or, at 
 any rate, if he had ever done so, it 
 was in a remote past, of which lan- 
 guage alone retained the trace ; * he 
 did not, in the times in which he is 
 really known to us, worship the storm, 
 or the sun, or the earth, or the ocean, 
 or the winds, or the rivers, but, by the 
 power of his imagination, he invested 
 all these things with personality. 
 Everywhere around him, in all the dif- 
 ferent localities, and departments, and 
 divisions, and subdivisions of the phys- 
 ical world, he recognized agencies of 
 unseen beings endued with life, voli- 
 tion, and design. Nature was peopled 
 for him with a countless multitude 
 of such invisible powers, some inhab- 
 iting the earth, some the heaven, some 
 the sea, some the dark and dreadful re- 
 gion beneath the earth, into which the 
 sun's rays could not penetrate. " Of 
 such beings," as Mr. Grote observes,! 
 " there were numerous varieties, and 
 many gradations both in power and 
 attributes ; there were differences of 
 .age, sex, and local residence, relations, 
 both conjugal and filial, between them, 
 and tendencies sympathetic as \vell as 
 repugnant. The gods formed a sort 
 of political community of their own, 
 which had its hierarchy, its distribu- 
 tions of ranks and duties, its conten- 
 tions for power, and occasional revo- 
 lutions, its public meetings in the 
 : agora of Olympus, and its multitudi- 
 nous banquets or festivals. The great 
 'Olympic gods were, in fact, only the 
 most exalted among an aggregate of 
 quasi-human or ultra-human person- 
 ages daemons, heroes, nymphs, epon- 
 ymous genii, identified with each 
 river, mountain, cape, town, village, 
 -or known circumscription of territory, 
 
 * Zeus may have been once Dyaus, " the 
 sky" (Max Muiler, "Chips from a German 
 Workshop," vol. ii. p. 72) ; but the word very 
 early "became a proper name" and desig- 
 nated a person. 
 
 t " History of Greece," vol. i. .pp. 4 6 3~4 
 
 besides horses, bulls, and dogs, of im- 
 mortal breed and peculiar attributes, 
 nonsters of strange lineaments and 
 combinations ' Gorgons, and Hy- 
 dras, and Chimaeras dire' and be- 
 sides 'gentile and ancestral deities,' 
 and ' peculiar beings whose business 
 t was to co-operate or impede in the 
 various stages of each trade or busi- 
 ness.' 5) 
 
 164. Numerous additions might be 
 made to this list. Not only had each 
 mountain chain and mountain-top a 
 separate presiding god or goddess, 
 Dut troops of Oreads inhabited the 
 mountain regions, and disported them- 
 selves among them ; not only was 
 there a river-god to each river, a Si- 
 nois and a Scamander, an Enipeus and 
 an Acheloiis, but every nameless 
 stream and brooklet had its water- 
 nymph, every spring and fountain its 
 naiad ; wood-nymphs peopled the 
 lades and dells of the forest regions ; 
 air-gods moved in the zephyrs and the 
 breezes ; each individual oak had its 
 dryad. To the gods proper were 
 added the heroes, gods of a lower 
 grade, and these are spoken of as 
 " thirty thousand in number, guardian 
 daemons, spirits of departed heroes, 
 who are continually walking over 
 earth, veiled in darkness, watching 
 the deeds of men, and dispensing 
 weal or woe." * 
 
 165. It is this multiplicity of the 
 objects of worship, together with their 
 lively active personality, which forms 
 the first striking feature of the ancient 
 Greek religion, and naturally attracts 
 the attention of observers in the first 
 instance. Nowhere have we such a 
 multitudinous pantheon. Not only was 
 the multiplicity of external* nature re- 
 flected in the spiritual world as in a 
 mirror, but every phase, and act, and 
 circumstance of human life, every 
 quality of the mind, every attribute 
 of the" body, might be, generally was, 
 personified, and became a divine be- 
 ing. Sleep and Death, Old Age and 
 
 * Thirlwall, " History of Greece," vol. i. p. 
 235. Compare Hesiod, " Works and Days," 
 1. 250. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [145] 67 
 
 Pain, Strength, Force, Strife, Victory, 
 Battle, Murder, Hunger, Dreaming. 
 Memory, Forgetfulness, Lawlessness, 
 Law, Forethought, Afterthought, Grief, 
 Ridicule, Retribution, Recklessness, 
 Deceit, Wisdom, Affection, Grace, 
 were gods or goddesses, were pre- 
 sented to the mind as persons, and 
 had their place in the recognized 
 Theogonies,* or systematic arrange 
 ments of the chief deities according 
 to supposed relationship and descent. 
 Similarly, the facts of Nature, as dis- 
 tinct from her parts, were personified 
 and worshiped, Chaos, Day, Night, 
 Time, the Hours, Dawn, Darkness, 
 Lightning, Thunder, Echo, the Rain- 
 bow, were persons " persons, just as 
 much as Zeus and Apollo " t though 
 not, perhaps, so uniformly regarded 
 in this light. 
 
 166. Another leading feature in the 
 system is the existence of marked 
 gradations of rank and power among 
 the gods, who fall into at least five 
 definite classes,! clearly distin- 
 guished the one from the other. First 
 and foremost come the Olympic dei- 
 ties, twelve in number, six male and 
 six female, but not as a rule con- 
 nected together in pairs Zeus, Pose- 
 idon, Apollo, Ares, Hephaestus, Her- 
 mes, Hera, Athene', Artemis, Aphro- 
 dite, Hestia, and Demeter. Next in 
 order are the great bulk of the gods 
 and goddesses, Hades, Dionysus, 
 Cronus, Uranus, Hyperion, Helios, 
 Nereus, Proteus, ^Eolus, Leto, Dione*, 
 Persephone, Hecate, Selene', Themis, 
 Harmonia, the Graces, the Muses, 
 the Fates, the Furies, the Eileithyice, 
 the Oceanids, the Nereids, the 
 Nymphs, the Naiads and the like. 
 In the third rank may be placed 
 the deities who act as attendants 
 on the greater gods, and per- 
 form services for them, Iris, the mes- 
 senger of Jove, Hebe*, his cup-bearer, 
 Kratos and Bia, the servants of Heph- 
 aestus,! Boreas, Notus, etc., subordi- 
 
 * Hesiod, " Theogon," 11. 114-264; Apol- 
 lodorus, " Bibliotheca," i. 1-6. 
 
 t Grote, " History of Greece," vol. i. p. 2. 
 
 J Ibid., pp. 14, 15. 
 
 See yEschyl. " Prom. Vinct." sub init. 
 
 nates of ^Eolus, the Hours, handmaids 
 of Aphrodite, etc. Fourthly, we may 
 name the more shadowy gods and 
 goddesses, Night, Day, Ether, Dawn, 
 Darkness, Death, Sleep, Strife, Mem- 
 ory, Fame, Retribution, Reckless- 
 ness, etc., who do not often appear 
 as deities except in poetry, and are 
 perhaps rather personifications con- 
 sciously made than real substantive 
 divinities. Finally must be mentioned 
 the monstrous births ascribed to cer- 
 tain divine unions or marriages, e. g. y 
 the Cyclopes, and Centimani, the off- 
 spring of Earth and Heaven (Gsea 
 and Uranus) ; the Harpies, daughters 
 of Thaumas and Electra, one of the 
 Oceanidae ; the Gorgons and Grasse. 
 children of Phorcys and Ceto ; Chry- 
 saor and Pegasus, born of the blood of 
 Medusa, when she was slain by Perse- 
 us ; Geryon and Echidna, sprung from 
 Chrysaor and Callirrhoe ; Orthros, 
 the two-headed dog of Geryon, born 
 of Typhaon and Echidna ; Cerberus, 
 the dog of Hades, with fifty heads ;- 
 Scylla and Charybdis ; the Lemasan 
 Hydra, the Sphinx of Thebes, the 
 Nemean Lion, the Dragon of the 
 Hesperides, the Centaurs, the Chi- 
 msera, etc., etc. 
 
 167. The chief interest naturally 
 attaches to the gods of the First Order, 
 those commonly denominated " Olym- 
 pic ;" and, in a work like the present, 
 some account must necessarily be 
 given of the twelve deities who con-, 
 stituted the Olympian council. 
 
 ZEUS. 
 
 1 68. At the head of all, occupying 
 a position quite unique and unlike 
 that of any ether, stood the great 
 
 | Zeus. Zeus is " the God, or, as he is- 
 called in later times, the Father of the 
 gods and the God of gods. When 
 we ascend to the most distant heights 
 of Greek history, the idea of God, as 
 the Supreme Being, stands before us 
 as a simple fact." * " Zeus," said an 
 ancient poet, " is the beginning ; Zeus 
 the middle ; out of Zeus have all things 
 
 * Max Mullet " Chips," vol. ii. p. 148. 
 
[146] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 ijeen made." Zeus was "the lord of 
 the upper regions, who dwelt on the 
 summits of the highest mountains, 
 gathered the clouds about him, shook 
 the air with his thunder, and wielded 
 the lightning as the instrument of his 
 wrath. From elements drawn from 
 these different sources his character, 
 a strange compound of strength and 
 weakness, seems to have been formed 
 by successive poets, who, if they in 
 some degree deserved the censure 
 'of the philosophers, seem at least not 
 'to have been guilty of any arbitrary 
 fictions ; while, on the other hand, by 
 establishing his supremacy they in- 
 troduced (?) a principle of unity into 
 'the Greek polytheism, which was not 
 perhaps without influence on the 
 speculations of the philosophers 
 themselves, though it exerted little 
 on the superstitions of the vulgar. 
 The Olympian deities are assembled 
 round Zeus as his family, in which he 
 maintains the mild dignity of a pa- 
 triarchal king. He assigns their sev- 
 bral provinces, and controls their 
 authority. Their combined efforts 
 cannot give the slightest shock to his 
 jpower, nor retard the execution of his 
 will ; and hence their waywardness, 
 pven when it incurs his rebuke, can- 
 hot ruffle the inward serenity of his 
 soul. The tremendous nod, where- 
 with he confirms his decrees, can 
 neither be revoked nor frustrated. 
 As his might is irresistible, so is his 
 >visdom unsearchable. He holds the 
 golden balance in which are poised 
 the destinies of nations and of men ; 
 from the two vessels that stand at his 
 threshold he draws the good and 
 evil gifts that alternately sweeten 
 and embitter mortal existence. The 
 eternal order of things, the ground 
 of the immutable succession of events, 
 is his, and therefore he himself sub- 
 mits to it. Human laws derive their 
 sanction from his ordinance ; earthly 
 kings receive their scepter from his 
 hand ; he is the guardian of social 
 rights ; he watches over the ful- 
 fillment of contract's, the observance 
 of oaths ; he punishes treachery, ar- 
 rogance, and cruelty. The stranger 
 
 and the suppliant are under his pe- 
 culiar protection ; the fence that en- 
 closes the family dwelling is in his 
 keeping; he avenges the denial and 
 the abuse of hospitality. Yet even 
 this greatest and most glorious of be- 
 ings, as he is called, is sub- 
 ject, like the other gods, to pas- 
 sion and frailty. For, though se- 
 cure from dissolution, though sur- 
 passingly beautiful and strong, and 
 warmed with a purer blood than fills 
 the veins of men, their heavenlj 
 frames are not insensible to pleasure 
 and pain ; they need the refreshment 
 of ambrosial food, and inhale a grate- 
 ful savor from the sacrifices of their 
 worshipers. Their other affections 
 correspond to the grossness of these 
 animal appetites. Capricious love 
 and hatred, anger and jealousy, often 
 disturb the calm of their bosoms ; 
 the peace of the Olympian state might 
 be broken by factions, and even by 
 conspiracies formed against its chief. 
 He himself cannot keep perfectly aloof 
 from their quarrels ; he occasionally 
 wavers in his purpose, is overruled by 
 artifice, blinded by desires, and hur- 
 ried by resentment into unseemly 
 violence. The relation in which he 
 stands to Fate is not uniformly rep- 
 resented in the Homeric poems, and 
 probably the poet had not formed a 
 distinct notion of it. Fate is gener- 
 ally described as emanating from his 
 will, but sometimes he appears to be 
 no more than the minister of a stern 
 necessity, which he wishes in vain to 
 elude." * 
 
 169. And Zeus bears to man the 
 relation of "father." Each mortal 
 who has a supplication to make to 
 him, may address him as 2> K-a-ep, 
 " God (our) Father." He bears, as 
 one of his most usual titles, the des- 
 ignation of " Father of gods and 
 men." As St. Paul says,f quoting a 
 Greek poet, "we are his offspring." 
 The entire passage where these words 
 occur is remarkable, and very instruc- 
 tive on the Grecian idea of Zeus. 
 
 * Thirlwall "History of Greece," vol. i. 
 pp. 217-219. 
 t Acts xvii. 28. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. [147] 
 
 44 With Zeus begin we let no mortal voice 
 Leave Zeus unpraised. Zeus fills the haunts 
 
 of men, 
 The streets, the marts Zeus fills the sea, 
 
 the .shores, 
 
 The harbors everywhere we live in Zeus. 
 We are his offspring too ; friendly to man, 
 He gives prognostics; sets mn to their 
 
 toil 
 
 By need of daily bread : tells when the land 
 Must be upturned by plowshare or by 
 
 spade 
 
 What time to plant the olive or the vine 
 What time to fling on earth the golden grain. 
 For He it was who scattered o'er the sky 
 The shining stars, and fixed them where they 
 are 
 
 Provided constellations through the year, 
 To mark the seasons in their changeless 
 
 course. 
 Wherefore men worship Him the First 
 
 the Last 
 Their Father Wonderful their Help and 
 
 Shield."* 
 
 170. A pantheistic tinge.' pervades 
 this description ; but still in parts it 
 approaches to some of the most beau- 
 tiful and sublime expressions of Holy 
 Writf It presents Zeus to us as 
 omnipresent, beneficent, worthy of 
 perpetual praise, our father, our help 
 and defense, our support and stay. 
 It sets him forth as "wonderful," or 
 rather " a mighty wonder " f^7 a 6ai \ ua 
 a being beyond our power to com- 
 prehend, whom we must be content to 
 reverence and admire. It recognizes 
 him as having hung the stars in the 
 blue vault of heaven, and having set 
 them there " for signs, and for seasons, 
 and for days, and years." It calls 
 him "the First" and "the Last" 
 the Alpha and the Omega of being. 
 
 171. Such is the strength of , Zeus, 
 according to the Greek idea ; but 
 withal there is a weakness about 
 him, which sinks him, not only be- 
 low the " Almighty " of Scripture, 
 but even below the Ormazd of the 
 Persians. He has a material frame, 
 albeit of an ethereal and subtle 
 
 * Aratus, " Phenomena," 11. 1-15. 
 
 t Compare "everywhere we live in Zeus " 
 with " in Him we live, and move, and have 
 our being " (Acts xvii. 28) the provision of 
 constellations with Gen. i. 14 the term 
 "Wonderful" with Isa. ix. 6 "the First, 
 the Last" with Rev. i. 8, u, etc. "their 
 Help and Shield " with Psa. xviii. 2 ; xlvi. i, 
 etc. 
 
 fiber; and requires material suste- 
 nance. According to some of the 
 myths, he was born in time ; accord- 
 ing to all, he was once a god of small 
 power. Heaven had its revolutions 
 in the Greek system : and as the sov- 
 ereignty of Olympus had passed from 
 Uranus to Cronus, and from Cronu: 
 to Zeus in former times, so in the fut- 
 ure it might pass, and according to 
 some, was doomed to pass, from Zeus 
 to another.* Nor was he without 
 moral defect. A rebellious son, a 
 faithless husband, not always a kin$ 
 father, he presented to the moral con- 
 sciousness no perfect pattern for man's 
 imitation, but a strange and monstrous 
 combination of wickedness with high 
 qualities, of weakness with strength, 
 
 of good with evil.f 
 fe ' 
 
 
 POSEIDON. 
 
 172. Poseidon is reckoned as the 
 second of the Olympic gods, rather 
 as being, in the mythology, the brother 
 of Zeus, than from any superiority of 
 his own over the rest of the Olympi- 
 ans. $ He is viewed as especially 
 the god of the sea, and is worshiped 
 chiefly by maritime states and .in 
 cities situated on or near the coast;; 
 but he has also a considerable hold 
 upon the land, and is " earth-shak- 
 ing" and "earth-possessing," quite as 
 decidedly as sovereign ruler of the 
 seas and ocean. His worship is 
 ancient, and in many places has given 
 way to an introduction of later arid 
 more fashionable deities. It has 
 traces of a rudeness and roughness 
 that are archaic, and stands connected 
 with the more grotesque and barba- 
 rous element in the religion. " Among 
 his companions are wild Titans and 
 spiteful daemons," human sacrifices 
 
 *yEschyl, " Prom. Vinct." 11. 939-959. 
 
 t Compare Mr. Gladstone's remarks in his 
 " Homer and the Homeric Age," vol. ii. pp. 
 186-190. 
 
 J Poseidon claims in the " Iliad," an au- 
 thority within his own domain independent 
 of Zeus ("Iliad," xv. 174 et seqq,}, but exer- 
 cises no right of rule over any other god. 
 
 Curtius, " History of Greece," vol. i. p. 
 56. 
 
70 [148] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 are offered to him ; horses are buried 
 alive in his honor ; Polyphemus the 
 .Cyclops, whom Ulysses punishes, is 
 his son ; and his offspring generally 
 are noted for huge size and great cor- 
 poreal strength.* It has been main- 
 tained that his cult was of foreign 
 origin, having been introduced among 
 the Greeks by the Carians,t or by the 
 Libyans ; $ but there are no sufficient 
 .grounds for these refinements, or for 
 separating off Poseidon from the bulk 
 of the Olympic deities, admittedly of 
 native growth, and having a general 
 family resemblance. If Poseidon is 
 cast in a ruder and rougher mold 
 than most of the others, we may ac- 
 count for it by the character of his 
 element, and the boisterousness of 
 sailors, who were at all times his prin- 
 cipal worshipers. Poseidon's rough- 
 ness is compensated for by a solidity 
 and strength of character, not too 
 common among the Grecian deities ; 
 he is not readily turned from his pur- 
 pose ; blandishments have little effect 
 upon him ; failure does not discour- 
 .age him ; he is persistent, and gener- 
 ally, though not always, successful. 
 His hostility to Troy, arising from his 
 treatment by Laomedon, conduced 
 greatly toward that city's destruction, 
 and the offense which he took at the 
 decision of Erechtheus led to the final 
 overthrow of that hero's family. On 
 the other hand, his persecution of 
 Ulysses, on account of the chastise- 
 ment which he had inflicted on Poly- 
 phemus, does not prevent the final re- 
 turn of that much-enduring wanderer 
 to Ithaca, nor does his opposition 
 succeed in hindering the settlement 
 of ./Eneas, with his Trojan compan- 
 ions, in Latium. For grandeur and 
 sublimity of character and position 
 Poseidon cannot compare with Zeus, 
 whom, however, he sometimes ven- 
 tures to beard ; in respect of moral 
 conduct he is in no way Zeus's supe- 
 
 rior : in respect of intellectual eleva- 
 tion he falls decidedly below him. 
 
 APOLLO. 
 
 173. The conception of Apollo as 
 the sun is a late form of Hellenic be- 
 lief, and must be wholly put aside 
 when we are considering the religion 
 of the ancient Greeks. Apollo seems 
 to have been originally, like Zeus, a 
 representation of the one God, origi- 
 nating probably in some part of Greece 
 where Zeus was unknown,* and sub- 
 sequently adopted into the system prev- 
 alent in Homeric times, and in this 
 system subordinated to Zeus as his son 
 and interpreter. Compared with Zeus, 
 he is a spiritualized conception. Zeus 
 is the embodiment of creative energy 
 and almighty power : Apollo of divine 
 prescience, of healing skill, and of 
 musical and poetic production. " In 
 Apollo Hellenic polytheism received 
 its harmonious completion, and the 
 loftiest glorification of which it was 
 capable." f 
 
 174. Apollo rises on the vision of 
 one familiar with Greek antiquity as 
 almost a pure conception, almost an 
 angelic divinity. To a form of ideal 
 beauty, combining youthful grace and. 
 vigor with the fullest perfection of 
 manly strength, he added unerring 
 wisdom, complete insight into futurity, 
 an unstained iife,-t the magic power 
 of song, ability and will to save and 
 heal, together with the dread preroga- 
 tive of dealing out at his pleasure de- 
 struction and death. Compassionate 
 on occasions as Mercy herself, he 
 shows at times the keen and awful 
 seventy of a destroying archangel. 
 Ekebolos, "striking from afar," he 
 speeds his fatal shafts from his unfail- 
 ing bow, and smites whomsoever he 
 will with a death-stroke which there is 
 no escaping. Never offended without 
 cause, never moved by caprice, he 
 
 * Horn. " Odyssey," xi. 505-520. 
 
 t Curtius, vol. i. p. 298 : " The Carians in- 
 troduced [into GreeceJ the worship of the 
 Carian Zeus, and of Poseidon." 
 
 \ Herod, ii. 50; iv. 188. 
 
 Hom. "Iliad," xv. 175. 
 
 * Curtius suggests Lycia or Crete (" His- 
 tory of Greece," vol. i. p. 59). 
 
 t Ibid. 
 
 \ See this point discussed in Mr. Glad- 
 stone's " Homer and the Homeric Age " (vol. 
 ii. pp. 106-111). 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [149] 71 
 
 works the will of Zeus in all that he 
 does, dispenses retributive justice, and 
 purifies with wholesome fear the souls 
 of men. Partaker of all the counsels 
 of his father, and permitted to use his 
 discretion in communicating them to 
 the denizens of earth, he delivers his 
 oracular responses from the various 
 spots which he has chosen as his 
 special abodes, and, though sometimes 
 his replies may be of doubtful import, 
 seldom sends away a votary unsatis- 
 fied. The answers which he gives, or 
 at any rate is supposed to give, deter- 
 mine the decisions of statesmen,* and 
 shape the course of history. War and 
 peace, treaties and alliances, are made 
 and unmade, as the Delphic and other 
 oracles inspired by him advise ; and 
 the course of Hellenic colonization is 
 almost entirely determined by his de- 
 crees.t 
 
 175. Poet, prophet, physician, harp- 
 er, god of victory and angel of death 
 in one, Apollo is always on the side 
 of right, always true to Zeus, and not 
 much inferior to him in power. It is, 
 perhaps, a fanciful analogy which has 
 been traced between him and the Sec- 
 ond Person of the Christian Trinity ;$ 
 but the very fact that such an analogy 
 can be suggested is indicative of the 
 pure and lofty character of the god, 
 
 * Herod, vii. 140-143. 
 
 t Ibid. iv. 150-159; v. 42, etc. 
 
 \ Friedrich says : " This triad of Zeus, 
 Athene, and Apollo bears an unmistakable 
 analogy to the Christian Trinity of Father, 
 Son, and Holy Ghost : Zeus answering to God 
 the Father, Athene to the Holy Ghost, and 
 Apollo to the Son of God, the Declarer of the 
 will of his Heavenly Father" ("Die Realten 
 in der Iliade und Odyssee," part iii. pp. 635 
 and 689). Mr. Gladstone came independently | 
 to the same conclusion, and says : " In Apollo 
 are represented the legendary anticipations of 
 a person to come, in whom should be com- 
 bined all the great offices in which God the 
 Son is now made known to man, as the Light 
 of our paths, the Physician of our diseases, 
 the Judge of our misdeeds, and the Conqueror 
 and Disarmer, but not yet Abolisher, of 
 death " (" Homer and the Homeric Age," 
 vol. ii. p. 132). Professor Max Miiller, on 
 the other hand, thinks that " it seems blas- 
 phemy to consider the fables of the heathen 
 world as corrupted and misinterpreted frag- 
 ments of a divine revelation once granted to 
 the whole of mankind " (" Chips from a Ger- 
 man Workshop," vol. ii. p. 13). 
 
 which equals at any rate, if it does 
 not transcend, the highest ideal of 
 divinity that has hither to been elabo- 
 rated by unassisted human wisdom. 
 
 ARES. 
 
 
 
 176. It has been well said that Ares 
 is " the impersonation of a passion." 
 That combative propensity, which man 
 possesses in common with a large 
 number of animals, was regarded by 
 the Greeks, not only as a divine thing, 
 but as a thing of such lofty divinity 
 that its representative must have a 
 place among the deities of the first 
 class or order. The propensity itself 
 was viewed as common to man with 
 the gods, and as having led to " wars 
 in heaven," wherein all the greater 
 deities had borne their part. Now 
 that peace was established in the 
 Olympian abode, it found a vent on 
 earth, and caused the participation of 
 the gods in the wars carried on among 
 mortals. Ares was made the son of 
 Zeus and Hera, the king and queen 
 of heaven. He was represented as 
 tall, handsome, and active, but as 
 cruel, lawless, and greedy of blood. 
 The finer elements of the warlike 
 spirit are not his. He is a divine 
 Ajax,* rather than a divine Achilles ; 
 and the position which he occupies in 
 the Olympian circle is low. Apollo 
 and Athene are both entitled to give 
 him their orders ; and Athene scolds 
 him, strikes him senseless, and wounds 
 him through the spear of Diomed.f 
 His worship is thought to have been 
 derived from Thrace, $ and to have 
 been introduced into Greece only a 
 little before the time of Homer. It 
 was at no time very widely spread, or 
 much affected by any Grecian tribe 
 or state, the conception being alto- 
 
 *Mr. Gladstone says, "not so much an 
 Ajax as a Caliban" ("Homer and the Ho- 
 meric Age," vol. ii. p. 228) ; but is not this too 
 harsh a view, even of the Homeric conception 
 of Ares? 
 
 tHom. "Iliad," v. 885-887; xv. 110-142, 
 etc. 
 
 | Dollinger, " Jew and Gentile," vol. i. p. 88. 
 
 Gladstone, " Homer and the Homeric 
 Age," vol. ii. pp. 229-231. 
 
.2 [150] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 gether too coarse to attract the sym- 
 pathies of a refined people. 
 
 ' 
 
 HEPH^STUS. 
 
 177. Hephccstus is the god of fire, 
 and especially of fire in connection 
 with smelting and metallurgy. He 
 dwells in Lemnos, where he habitually 
 forges thunderbolts for Zeus, and 
 occasionally produces fabrics in metal 
 of elaborate and exquisite construc- 
 tion. Among the most marvelous of 
 his works are the automatic tripods of 
 Olympus and the bronze maidens, 
 whom he has formed to be his attend- 
 ants on account of his lameness. He 
 is the armorer of heaven, and provides 
 the gods generally with the weapons 
 which they use in warfare. The pe- 
 culiarity of his lameness is strange and 
 abnormal, since the Greeks hate de- 
 formity, and represent their deities 
 generally as possessed of perfect phys- 
 ical beauty. It has been accounted 
 for on the supposition that he is a Gre- 
 cised Phthah,* introduced from Egypt, 
 directly or indirectly,! and that his de- 
 formity is a modification of Phthah's 
 presentment as a pigmy with the lower 
 limbs misshapen. But the features 
 common to Hephaestus with Phthah 
 are few; the name of Hephaestus is 
 probably of pure Greek etymology, 
 connected with V"*? and ^alvu arid, on 
 the whole, there would seem to be no 
 evidence that Hephaestus is a foreign 
 god more than any other. Rather, it 
 is characteristic of the many-sidedness 
 of the Greeks, and consequent upon 
 the anthropomorphism which makes 
 the Olympic community a reflection of 
 earthly things, that there should be 
 even in this august conclave some- 
 thing provocative of laughter, a dis- 
 cord to break the monotony of the 
 harmony, an element of grotesqueness 
 and monstrosity. Hephaestus in the 
 Olympic halls is like the jester at the 
 court of a medieval monarch, a some- 
 
 * Sir G. Wilkinson in Rawlinson's " Herod- 
 otus," vol. ii. p. 139, note (^cl edition). 
 
 t Mr. Gladstone regards him as introduced 
 from Phoenicia (" Homer and the Homeric 
 Age," vol. ii. p. 255). 
 
 thing to lighten the seriousness of ex- s 
 istence, to provoke occasionally a 
 burst of that *' inextinguishable laugh- 
 ter," without which life in so sublime 
 an atmosphere would be intolerable. 
 The marriage of Hephaestus to Aphro- 
 dite is conceived in the same spirit. 
 There was a keen sense of humor in 
 the countrymen of Aristophanes ; and 
 the combination of the clumsy, lame, 
 and begrimed smith with the Queen 
 of Beauty and Love pleased their sense ! 
 of the ludicrous, and was the fertile . 
 source of many an amusing legend. 
 " The Lay of the Net," wherewith De- 
 modocus entertains both gods and 
 men,* is a sufficient specimen of this 
 class of lively myth, and shows that 
 the comic features of ill-assorted mar- 
 riage, on which modern playwrights 
 have traded so freely, were fully appre- 
 ciated by the Greeks, and were sup- 
 posed well-suited to provoke the gods 
 to merriment. The modern moralist 
 will regret this unworthy represen- 
 tation of divine beings ;j but it is 
 quite in accord with the general char- 
 acter of the Greek religion, which 
 reflected back upon deity all that was 
 weak, as well as all that was strong, in 
 man. 
 
 HERMES. 
 
 178. Hermes is the impersonation 
 of commercial dealings, and hence a 
 god who gives wealth and increase, a 
 god of inventive power, and a god of 
 tricks and thievery. He is "the 
 Olympian man of business," $ and 
 therefore employed in embassies and 
 commissions, and even sometimes in 
 the simple carrying of messages. As 
 ti&Tup edwy, " the giver of comforts," 
 he secures his votaries all manner of 
 worldly prosperity. He is industrious 
 and inventive, constructs the seven- 
 stringed lyre before he is a day old,| 
 afterward invents the pan's-pipes, 
 
 * Horn. " Odyss." viii. 266-366. 
 
 t " Homer and the Homeric Age," vol. ii. 
 pp. 461-463- 
 
 J Dollinger, "Jew and Gentile," vol. i. p. 74, 
 
 Horn. " Odyss." viii. 335. Compare " Il- 
 iad," xiv. 490. 
 
 || Horn. " Hym. Merc." 1. 16. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [151] 73. 
 
 and, ultimately becomes a god of 
 wisdom and learning generally. His 
 thievishness must be taken to show 
 that commercial fraud is pretty well as 
 ancient as commerce itself, and that 
 " the good old times " were not, as 
 sometimes represented, an age of in- 
 nocence. It has been said that he is 
 more human than any other Olympian 
 god; and that "he represents, so to 
 speak, the utilitarian side of the hu- 
 man mind," * being active, energetic, 
 fruitful in resource, a keen bargainer, 
 a bold story-teller, and a clever thief. 
 His admission into the number of the 
 Olympians is the strongest possible 
 indication of the inferiority of the 
 moral standard among the Greeks. 
 The special regard paid to him by the 
 Athenians is, however, perhaps the 
 mere consequence of their addiction 
 to the pursuits of commerce. 
 
 179. Hermes is commonly repre- 
 sented as a youth just attaining to 
 manhood. The wings which adorn 
 his head and ankles indicate the ce- 
 lerity of his movements. His cadu- 
 ceus is perhaps the golden rod of 
 wealth given to him by Apollo in ex- 
 change for the lyre. It represents 
 also the staff commonly borne by 
 heralds, and in this point of view had 
 white ribbons attached to it, which in 
 later times became serpents. Some- 
 times he holds a purse in his hand, to 
 mark his power of bestowing riches. 
 
 180. The six female Olympic deities 
 'Hera, Athene, Artemis, Aphrodite', 
 Hestia, and Demeter have now to 
 be considered. 
 
 HERA. 
 
 iJSi. The anthropomorphism which 
 was so main an element in the Greek 
 religion made it requisite that mother- 
 hood, as well as fatherhood, should 
 be enthroned in the Olympic sphere, 
 that Zeus should have his consort, 
 heaven its queen, and women their 
 representative in the highest celestial 
 position. Hera was, perhaps, origi- 
 
 Homer and the Homeric Age," vol. ii. 
 
 p. 242. 
 
 nally Era, "the Earth;"* but this 
 idea was soon lost sight of, and in 
 Greek mythology, from first to last, 
 she is quite other than the principle 
 of mundane fecundity, quite a differ- 
 ent being from the oriental earth- 
 goddess, called indifferently Cybele', 
 Dindymene', Magna Mater, Rhea, 
 Beltis, Mylitta, etc. Hera is, pri- 
 marily, the wife of Zeus, the queen of 
 the Olympic court, the mistress of 
 heaven. She is " a reflected image 
 of Zeus," t and exercises all her hus- 
 band's prerogatives, thunders, shakes 
 Olympus, makes Iris her messenger, 
 gives her orders to the Winds and the 
 Sun, confers valor, and the like. As 
 the personification of maternity, she 
 presides over childbirth ; and the Eilei- 
 thyias, her daughters, act as her minis- 
 ters. She does not present to us an 
 elevated idea of female perfection, 
 since, despite her exalted rank, she 
 is subject to numerous feminine in- 
 firmities. Mr. Grote notes that she is 
 "proud, jealous, and bitter."^ Mr. 
 Gladstone observes that she is pas- 
 sionate, wanting in moral elevation, 
 cruel, vindictive, and unscrupulous. 
 Her mythological presentation was 
 certainly not of a nature to improve 
 the character of those women who 
 might take her for their model ; since, 
 although she was possessed of certain 
 great qualities, passion, fervor, strong 
 affection, self-command, courage, 
 acuteness, yet she was, on the whole, 
 wanting in the main elements of fe- 
 male excellence, gentleness, softness, 
 tenderness, patience, submission to 
 wrong, self-renunciation, reticence. 
 She was a proud, grand, haughty, 
 powerful queen ; not a kind, helpful, 
 persuasive, loving woman. The my- 
 thology of Greece is in few points 
 less satisfactory than in the type of 
 
 * See Mr. Gladstone's " Homer and the 
 Homeric Age," vol. ii. p. 190. Others sug- 
 gest a connection with heros, herus \ hera, and 
 so with the German herr and our sir. 
 
 t " Homer and the Homeric Age," vol. ii. p. 
 194. 
 
 j " History of Greece," vol. i. p. 50. 
 
 " Homer and the Homeric Age," vol. iLi 
 pp. 190-196. 
 
T4 [152] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 female character which it exhibits at 
 the head of its pantheon. 
 
 ATHENE. 
 
 182. If Hera is below the level of 
 female excellence which we might 
 have expected refined heathens to 
 have represented in a chief goddess, 
 Athene' is above the level. She has 
 a character which is without a flaw. 
 Originally, as it would seem, a con- 
 scious impersonation of the divine 
 wisdom, and therefore fabled to have 
 sprung full-grown from the head of 
 Zeus, she became a distinct and sub- 
 stantive deity at a very early date, 
 and was recognized as the " goddess 
 of wisdom, war, polity, and industrial 
 art."* Homer places her, together 
 with Zeus and Apollo, on a higher 
 platform of divinity than the other 
 deities,f and makes her even oppose 
 Zeus when he is in the wrong, thwart 
 him, and vindicate right and truth in 
 his despite^ It has been said that 
 she is " without feminine sympathies 
 the type of composed, majestic, 
 and unrelenting force ; " and this is 
 so far true that she has certainly little 
 softness, absolutely no weakness, and 
 not many distinctly feminine charac- 
 teristics. But she was recognized, 
 like her Egyptian counterpart, Neith, 
 as the goddess of good housewifery, 
 *' patronizing handicraft, and expert 
 at the loom and spindle," || no less 
 than as the wise directress of states- 
 men and warriors. Undoubtedly, the 
 atmosphere in which she removed 
 was too cold, calm, and clear for her 
 ever to have attached to herself any 
 very large share of human sympathy ; 
 but she exercised an elevating influ- 
 ence on the nobler spirits of both 
 sexes, as combining the three attri- 
 butes of purity, strength, and wisdom 
 in the highest possible degree, and so 
 furnishing at once a model for imita- 
 
 * " Homer and the Homeric Age," vol. ii. 
 p. 59. 
 
 t Horn. " Iliad," ii. 371 ; iv. 288 ; vii. 132, 
 etc. ; " Odyss." iv. 341 ; xvii. 132, etc. 
 
 J " Iliad," viii. 30-40. 
 
 Grote, " History of Greece," vol. i. p. 47. 
 
 U Ibid. 
 
 tion, and a support and stay for feeble 
 souls in the spirit world, where they 
 had otherwise little on which they 
 could place any firm reliance. The 
 universally-received myth of Mentor 
 and Telemachus acted as a strong re- 
 enforcement to the power of con- 
 science, which the young Greek felt 
 might be the voice of Athene speak- 
 ing within him, advising him for his 
 true good, and pointing out to him 
 the path of honor and duty. Athene's 
 special connection with Athens and 
 Attica added much to her import- 
 ance in the Greek religious system, 
 since it brought the best minds and 
 most generous natures of Hellas pe- 
 culiarly under the influence of a 
 thoroughly high and noble religious 
 conception. 
 
 ARTEMIS. 
 
 183. Artemis is altogether a shad- 
 owy divinity. She is a " pale reflec- 
 tion of her brother,"* Phcebus 
 Apollo, whose attributes she repro- 
 duces in a subdued form, being, like 
 him, majestic, pure, chaste, a minis- 
 ter of death, and a dexterous archer. 
 Nothing is peculiar to her except her 
 presidency over hunting, which deter- 
 mined her general presentation to 
 the eye by the Greek artists. She 
 embodied and personified that passion 
 for the chase which was common to 
 the Hellenes with most energetic 
 races. It was supposed that she 
 dwelt mainly upon earth, haunting 
 the forests and the mountains, dressed 
 as a huntress, and accompanied by 
 her favorite hounds. Her connection 
 with the moon was an after-thought 
 in the Greek mythology, as was that 
 of Apollo with the sun. It arose 
 mainly from the fact that hunters, to 
 be successful, had to commence their 
 operations by night, and needed the 
 light of the moon in order to make 
 their arrangements. 
 
 184. The Artemis of Ephesus was 
 the embodiment of a different idea.t 
 
 * " Homer and the Homeric Age," vol. ii. 
 
 P- 143- 
 
 t Grote, " History of Greece," vol. i. p. 48. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [153] 75 
 
 She took the place of the great Asi- 
 atic Nature-goddess Cybele, Rhea, 
 Magna Mater, Beltis, Mylitta and 
 had nothing in common with the Ar- 
 temis of Hellas proper but the name. 
 " Her image, shaped like a mummy, 
 was of black wood ; the upper part of 
 the body was ornamented with the 
 breasts of animals, the lower with 
 figures of them." * She was a mere 
 impersonation of the principle of fe- 
 cundity in nature " a Pantheistic 
 deity, with more of an Asiatic than 
 Hellenic character." f 
 
 APHRODITE. 
 
 185. Aphrodite is the antithesis 
 and in some sort the complement, of 
 Athene. She is the impersonation of 
 all that is soft and weak and erring 
 in female nature, as Athene is of all 
 that is high and pure and strong 
 Goddess of beauty and love, not, how- 
 ever, of love in its more elevated form, 
 but rather of sensual desire, she was 
 received by the Greeks probably from 
 an Asiatic source, but so transmuted 
 and Hellenized as to have become, 
 when we first meet with her, a com- 
 pletely national divinity.! Hellenic 
 in the whole character of her beauty, 
 she is well described by a living Eng- 
 lish poet in her passage which is 
 eminently classical : 
 
 " Idalian Aphrodite beautiful, 
 
 Fresh as the foam, new bathed in Paphian 
 
 wells, 
 
 With rosy slender ringers backward drew 
 From her warm brow and bosom her deep 
 
 hair 
 
 Ambrosial, golden round her lucid throat 
 And shoulder : from the violets her light 
 
 foot 
 
 Shone rosy white, and o'er her rounded form, 
 Between the shadows of the vine-branches, 
 Floated the golden sunlight as she moved." 
 
 Nothing so lovely in form and color 
 
 * Dollinger, " Tew and Gentile," vol. i. p. 86. 
 
 t Ibid. 
 
 \ Mr. Gladstone takes a^ different view. 
 He regards the Aphrodite of Homer as 
 scarcely a Greek divinity (" Homer and the 
 Homeric Age," vol. ii. pp. 244, 245). But to 
 me it seems that, even in Homer, her char- 
 acter is as thoroughly Greek as her name. 
 
 See Tennyson's " CEnone," 11. 170-178. 
 
 and texture and combination of rare 
 charms, graced the splendid cham- 
 bers of the Olympian court nothing 
 so ravishing had ever presented itself 
 to the vision of painter or poet. But 
 the beauty was altogether physical, 
 sensuous, divorced alike from moral 
 goodness and mental power. Silly 
 and childish, easily tricked and im- 
 posed upon, Aphrodite is mentally 
 contemptible, while morally she is 
 odious. Tyrannical over the weak, 
 cowardly before the strong, frail her- 
 self, and the persistent stirrer up of 
 frailty in others, lazy, deceitful, treach- 
 erous, selfish, shrinking from the least 
 touch of pain, she repels the moral 
 sentiment with a force almost equal 
 to that wherewith she attracts the 
 lower animal nature. Hence the 
 Greek cannot speak of her without 
 the most violent conflict of feeling. 
 He is drawn to her, but he detests 
 her ; he is fascinated, yet revolted ; he 
 admires, yet he despises and con- 
 demns ; and his condemnation, on 
 the whole, outweighs his admiration. 
 He calls her 
 
 " A goddess verily of many names 
 Not Cypris only, iDut dark Hades, too, 
 And Force resistless, and mad, frantic Rage, 
 And sheer untempered Craving, and shrill 
 Grief."* 
 
 He allows, but he rebels against her 
 power over him ; he protests even 
 when he surrenders himself ; and 
 hence, on the whole, Aphrodite exer- 
 cises a less corrupting influence in 
 Greece than might have been antici- 
 pated. That the pantheon should 
 contain a goddess of the kind was of 
 course to some extent debasing. Bad 
 men could justify themselves by the 
 divine example, and plead powerless- 
 ness to resist a divine impulse. But 
 their conscience was not satisfied ; 
 they felt they sinned against their 
 higher nature ; and thus, after all, the 
 moral standard was not very seri- 
 ously affected by the existence of the 
 Cyprean goddess among the Olympic 
 deities. 
 
 Sophocl. Fragm. xxiii. (cd. Brunei:). 
 
70 [154] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 HESTIA. r -Q , 
 
 186. Hestia is still more shadowy 
 than Artemis. She is in part the fem- 
 inine counterpart of Hephaestus, the 
 goddess of fire ; but she is principally 
 the impersonation of the sacred char- 
 acter of each hearth and home, 
 whether domestic, tribal, or national. 
 Hestia presided over the private 
 hearths and homesteads of all Greeks, 
 over the Prytaneia of cities, and over 
 the altars kept ablaze in the temples 
 which were centers of confederacies. 
 She invested them with a sacred char- 
 acter, watched over them, protected 
 them. Her personality was but 
 slightly developed. Still she seems 
 to have been regarded as possessing, 
 to a remarkable extent, the qualities 
 of holiness and purity ; and thus to 
 have practically maintained in Greek 
 domestic life a high and pure stand- 
 ard, such as has scarcely been much 
 exceeded among Christians. She was 
 fabled to have vowed perpetual vir- 
 ginity ; and it is clear that, together 
 with Athene' and Artemis, she upheld 
 among the Greeks the idea of virginal 
 purity as a transcendental phase of 
 life, a moral perfection whereto the 
 best and purest might not only aspire, 
 but attain, as the result of earnest en- 
 deavor. 
 
 DEMETER. 
 
 187. Demeter, the "Earth-Moth- 
 er," was an Original Greek concep- 
 tion, corresponding to one common 
 among the Oriental nations, the con- 
 ception personified by Maut in Egypt, 
 Beltis or Mylitta in Babylon, Cybele 
 in Phrygia, etc. The earth on which 
 man lives, and from which he derives 
 the food that sustains him, was viewed 
 as a kind and bountiful parent the 
 nurse, the feeder, the supporter, the 
 sustainer of mankind. Personified as 
 a goddess, she demanded the wor- 
 ship and gratitude of all, and was 
 hence a universal deity, though spe- 
 cially honored in certain places. In 
 the Greek religion JDemeter was 
 closely connected with agriculture, 
 since the. earth in Greece did not sup- 
 
 port men without toil. She made the 
 Greeks acquainted with the growing 
 of cereals, the operations of tillage 
 and bread-making. Moreover, as 
 agriculture was " the foundation of 
 all social and political ordinances, 
 and inseparably connected with the 
 introduction of peaceable and orderly 
 ways of life, Demeter, under her title 
 of 'Thesmophoros, was the ennobler 
 of mankind, the founder of civilization 
 and lawgiving." She was thus more 
 in Greece than she was in Asia. Her 
 position in the greatest of the myste- 
 riesthe Eleusinian was probably 
 owing to this double function, this 
 combination of a Nature-goddess with 
 a deity of law and order, the power 
 that led man on from the simple no- 
 madic condition to all the refinements 
 and complications of advanced polit- 
 ical life. 
 
 . 
 
 " These were the prime in order and in might ; 
 The rest were long to tell, though far re- 
 
 nown'd, 
 
 Th' Ionian gods, of Javan's issue held 
 Gods, yet confess'd later than heav'n and 
 
 earth, 
 Their boasted parents: Titan, Heav'n's 
 
 first-born, 
 With his enormous brood, and birthright 
 
 seiz'd 
 
 By younger Saturn : he from mightier Jove, 
 His own and Reah's son, like measure 
 
 found : 
 So Jove usurping reign'd : these first in 
 
 Crete 
 
 And Ida known ; thence on the snowy top 
 Of cold Olympus rul'd the middle air, 
 Their highest heav'n ; or on the Delphian 
 
 t cliff, 
 
 Or in Dodona, and through all the bounds 
 Of Doric land ; or who with Saturn old 
 Fled over Adria to th' Hesperian fields, 
 And o'er the Celtic roam'd the utmost isles. 
 ****** 
 Nor had they yet among the sons of Eve 
 Got them new names ; till wand'ring o'er the 
 
 earth, 
 Through God's high suff 'ranee for the trial 
 
 of man, 
 
 By falsities and lies the greatest part 
 Of mankind they corrupted to forsake 
 God their Creator, and th' invisible 
 Glory of Him that made them to transform 
 Oft to the image of a brute, adorn'd 
 With gay religions full of pomp and gold, 
 And devils to adore for deities; 
 Then they were known to men by various 
 
 names, 
 And various idols through the heathen 
 
 world." 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 1155] 77 
 
 188. Among the deities external to 
 the Olympic circle, the most important 
 were Dionyes, Leto, Persephone, and 
 Hades or Aidoneus. Dionysus is gen- 
 erally admitted to have been derived 
 from" an Oriental source. The word 
 probably meant originally "the judge 
 of men/'* and referred to a special 
 function of the god, who was thought 
 to pass sentence on the departed when 
 they reached the other world. 
 
 189. Essentially, however, Dionysus 
 was the god of inebriety, the deifica- 
 tion, of drunkenness, as Ares was of 
 violence, and. Aphrodite of sensual 
 desire. He was viewed as the crea- 
 tor of the vine, or at any rate as its 
 introducer into Greece; the teacher 
 of its culture, and the discoverer of 
 the exhilarating properties of its fruit. 
 The worship of Dionysus was effected 
 by taking part in his orgies, and these 
 were of a furious and ecstatic charac- 
 ter, accompanied with exciting music, 
 with wild dances, with shrieks and 
 cries, and sometimes with bloodshed. 
 Both men and women joined in the 
 Dionysiac rites, the women outdoing 
 the men in the violence of their frenzy. 
 " Crowds of females, clothed with 
 fawn-skins, and bearing the sacred 
 thyrsus, flocked to the solitudes of 
 Parnassus or Cithseron or Taygetus, 
 during the consecrated triennial pe- 
 riod, passed the night there with 
 torches, and abandoned themselves 
 to demonstrations of frantic excite- 
 ment, with dancing and clamorous in- 
 vocation of the god. The men yielded 
 to a similar impulse by noisy revels 
 in the streets, sounding the cymbals 
 and tambourine, and carrying the im- 
 age of the god in procession." t 
 Every sort of license and excess was 
 regarded as lawful on these occasions, 
 and the worship of the deity was in- 
 complete unless the votary reached 
 an advanced stage of intoxication. 
 Dionysiac festivals were fortunately 
 not of frequent recurrence, and were 
 not everywhere celebrated in the same 
 way. At Athens women took no part 
 
 in the Dionysia; and with men intel- 
 lectual contests, and the witnessing of 
 them, held the place of the rude rev- 
 els elsewhere too common. Still the 
 influence of Dionysiac worship on 
 Greece generally must be regarded as 
 excessively corrupting, and Dionysus 
 must be viewed as, next to Aphrodite', 
 the most objectionable of the Greek 
 divinities. 
 
 190. Leto, or Latona, as the Ro- 
 mans called her, when they adopted 
 her into their pantheon, was, on the 
 contrary, one of the purer and more 
 elevating influences. She is the wife 
 of Zeus by a title quite as good as that 
 of Hera,* and is a model of motherly 
 love and wifely purity. Separate and 
 peculiar function she has none, and it 
 is difficult to account for her introduc- 
 tion among the Olympians. Perhaps 
 she is to be regarded as ideal woman- 
 hood. Silent, unobtrusive, always 
 subordinating herself to her children, 
 majestic, chaste, kindly, ready to help 
 and tend, she is in Olympus what the 
 Greek wished his wife to be in his own' 
 home, her very shadowiness according 
 with the Greek notion of womanly per- 
 fection. t Mr. Gladstone suggests that 
 she is a traditional deity, representing 
 the woman through whom man's re- 
 demption was to come ; $ but there 
 scarcely seems sufficient foundation 
 for this view, which is not supported 
 by any analogies in the mythologies 
 of other nations. 
 
 191. Persephone', the Roman Pro- 
 serpine, was the queen of the dead ; 
 far more than her shadowy husband, 
 Hades, the real ruler of the infernal 
 realm. She was represented as se- 
 verely pure and chaste, even having 
 become a wife against her will, and as 
 awful and terrible, but not cruel. She 
 occupied no very important post in 
 the religion, since her sphere was 
 wholly the nether world, which only 
 
 * See the "Transactions of the Society of 
 Biblical Archaeology," vol. ii. pp. 33, 34. 
 t Grote, " History of Greece," vol. i. p. 26. 
 
 * Hesiod says that she became the wife of 
 Zens before Hera (" Theogony," 11. 918-221). 
 
 t Compare the line, of Sophocles 
 " O woman, silence is the woman's crown." ' 
 (Ajax, 1. 293.) 
 
 \ " Homer and the Homeric Age," vol. ii. 
 P- 153- 
 
78 [156] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 very slightly engaged the attention of 
 the Hellenes. Hades, or Aidoneus, 
 had a high rank, as the brother of 
 Zeus, and in some sort his co-equal ; 
 but he was as shadowy as the realm 
 over which he presided, and to most 
 Greeks was simply magni nominis -um- 
 bra "the shadow of a great name," 
 which they must reverence when they 
 heard it, but not a deity who to any 
 extent occupied their thoughts, or re- 
 ceived their worship.* It would be 
 easy to occupy many more pages with 
 the Greek minor deities, but our lim- 
 its compel us to refrain, and to turn 
 at this point from the objects to the 
 character of the worship, and to the 
 real practical influence of their religion 
 upon the Greek race. 
 
 192. In the main, the Greek wor- 
 ship was of a joyous, pleasant, and 
 lightsome kind. The typical Greek 
 was devoid of any deep sense of sin 
 thought well of himself did not think 
 very highly of the gods, and consid- 
 ered that, so long as he kept free from 
 grave and heinous offenses, either 
 against the moral law or against the 
 amour-propre of the deities, he had 
 little to fear, while he had much to 
 hope, from them. He prayed and of- 
 fered sacrifice, not so much in the 
 way of expiation, or to deprecate God's 
 wrath, as in the way of natural piety, 
 to ask for blessings and to acknowl- 
 edge them. He made vows to the 
 gods in sickness, danger, or difficulty, 
 and was careful to perform his vow 
 on escape or recovery. His house 
 was full of shrines, on which he con- 
 tinually laid small offerings, to secure 
 the favor and protection of his special 
 patron deities. Plato says that he 
 prayed every morning and evening, 
 and also concluded every set meal 
 with a prayer or hymn. But these 
 devotions seem not to have been very 
 earnest or deep, and were commonly 
 
 * Compare Dollinger, "Jew and Gentile," 
 vol. i. p. 93 : " The people did not troubl^ 
 themselves much about Harks, and they saw 
 no altars dedicated to him. There was one 
 image of him at Athens, but he had hardly 
 anywhere a regular worship." 
 
 hurried through in a perfunctory man- 
 ner. 
 
 193. Practically, the religious wor- 
 ship of the Greeks consisted mainly 
 in attendance on festivals which might 
 be Pan-Hellenic, political, tribal, or 
 peculiar to a guild or a phratria. 
 Each year brought round either one 
 or two of the great panegyrics the 
 festivals of the entire Greek race at 
 Olympia and Delphi, at Nemea and 
 the Isthmus of Corinth. There were 
 two great Ionic festivals annually, one 
 at Delos, and the other at the Panio- 
 nium near Mycale. Each state and 
 city throughout Greece had its own 
 special festivals, Dionysia, Eleusinia, 
 Panathencea, Carneia, Hyakinthia, 
 Apaturia, etc. Most of these were 
 annual, and some lasted several clays. 
 A Greek had no "Sunday" no 
 sacred clay recurring at set intervals, ,. 
 on which his thoughts were bound to 
 be directed to religion ; but so long a 
 time as a week scarcely ever passed 
 without his calendar calling him to 
 some sacred observance or other, 
 some feast or ceremony, in honor of 
 some god or goddess, or in commem- 
 oration of some event important in 
 the history of mankind,* or in that of 
 his race, or of his city. And these 
 festivals were highly attractive to him. 
 Generally they were joyful occasions 
 from first to last, celebrated with 
 music, and processions, with gymnas- 
 tic or orchestral competitions, or with 
 theatrical contests. Ordinarily they 
 include sacrifice, and feasting upon 
 the victims sacrificed. Even when 
 they were professedly of a mournful 
 character, like the Spartan Hyakin- 
 thia, the opening days of which were 
 days of sadness and of gloom, they 
 commonly concluded with a more 
 genial time a time of banqueting 
 and dancing. Accordingly, the Greek 
 looked forward to his holy days as 
 true holidays, and was pleased to 
 combine duty with pleasure by taking 
 his place in the procession, or the 
 
 * E.g., the Hydrophoria, kept in commem- 
 oration of those who perished in the Flood 
 of Deucalion, the Greek representation of 
 the Noachical Deluge. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [157] 79 
 
 temple, or the theatre, to which incli- 
 nation and religion alike called him. 
 Thousands and tens of thousands 
 flocked to each of the great Pan-Hel- 
 lenic gatherings, delighting in the 
 splendor and excitement of the 
 scene, in the gay dresses, the magnif- 
 icent equipages, the races, the games, 
 the choric, and other contests. 
 " These festivals," as has been well 
 observed,* " were considered as the 
 very cream of the Greek life, their 
 periodical recurrence being expected 
 with eagerness and greeted with 
 joy." Similarly, though to a minor 
 extent, each national or even tribal 
 gathering was an occasion of enjoy- 
 ment ; cheerfulness, hilarity, some- 
 times an excessive exhilaration, pre- 
 vailed ; and the religion of the 
 Greeks, in these its most striking and 
 obvious manifestations, was altogether 
 bright, festive, and pleasurable. 
 
 194. But, just as sunshine cannot 
 exist without shadow, so even the 
 Greek religion, bright as it was, had 
 its dark side. Calamities befell na- 
 tions, families, or individuals, and 
 were attributed to an offended god or 
 a cruel fury. A sense of guilt occa- 
 sionally visited those who had com- 
 mitted great and flagrant crimes, as 
 perjury, blasphemy, robbery of tem- 
 ples, incest, violation of the right of 
 asylum, treachery toward a guest- 
 friend, and the like. A load under 
 these circumstances lay upon the con- 
 science ; all the horrors of remorse 
 were felt ; avenging fiends were be- 
 lieved to haunt and torture the guilty 
 one, who sometimes earnestly sought 
 relief for a term of years, and sought 
 in vain. There were, indeed, rites of 
 expiation appropriate to different oc- 
 casions ; most sins could be atoned 
 for in some manner or other ; but the 
 process was generally long and pain- 
 ful ; t and there were cases where the 
 persistent anger of the fierce Erinyes 
 could not in any way be appeased. 
 
 * Doliinger, " Jew and Gentile," vol. i. p. 
 238. 
 
 ^t See the "Eumenides" of ^Eschylus, 
 where Orestes, however, is at last purged of 
 his guilt. 
 
 When a nation had sinned, human 
 sacrifices were not unfrequently pre- 
 scribed ^as the only possible propitia- 
 tion ; * if the case were that of an in- 
 dividual, various modes of purification 
 were adopted, ablutions, fastings, sac- 
 rifices, and the like. According to 
 Plato, however, the number of those 
 who had any deep sense of their guilt 
 was few : most men, whatever crimes 
 they committed, found among the 
 gods examples of similar acts,f and 
 thought no great blame would attach 
 to them for their misconduct. At the 
 worst, if the gods were angered by 
 their [behavior, a few offerings would 
 satisfy them, and set things straight,^ 
 leaving the offenders free to repeat 
 their crimes, and so to grow more and 
 more hardened in iniquity. 
 
 195. At the position which the 
 " mysteries " occupied in the Greek 
 religion it is impossible for us, in 
 this slight sketch, to do more than 
 glance. The mysteries were certain 
 secret rites practiced by voluntary 
 associations of individuals, who 
 pledged themselves not to reveal to the 
 uninitiated anything which they saw 
 or heard at the secret meetings. They 
 were usually connected with the wor- 
 ship of some particular god, and con- 
 sisted mainly in symbolical represen- 
 tations of the adventures and circum- 
 stances connected with the god in the 
 mythology. They contained nothing 
 that was contradictory to the popular 
 religion, and little that was explana- 
 tory of it. The various mysteries had 
 each its own apparatus of symbols and 
 formularies, by which the mysta knew 
 each other, as freemasons do ; but 
 they only vaguely hinted at any theo- 
 logical dogmas or opinions. The 
 Greek greatly affected these secret 
 rites ; and it is said that but few 
 Greeks were not initiated in some 
 mystery or other. " Their attrac- 
 tion lay in their veil of secrecy, trans- 
 
 * Even as' late as the time of Solon, Epi- 
 menides prescribed a human sacrifice at 
 Athens. 
 
 t Plato, " Republic," ii. 17. 
 
 193- 
 
 Dollinger, " Jew and Gentile," vol. i. p. 
 
80 [158] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 parent though it was, in the variety of 
 feelings brought into play by lively 
 dramatic representations, in the rapid 
 transition from anxiety and suspense 
 to serenity and joy, the combination 
 of all arts and artistic enjoyments, 
 of music and song, the mimic dance, 
 the brilliant lighting- up, and effective 
 decoration." * It can scarcely, how- 
 ever, be said that the mysteries exer- 
 cised any salutary or elevating influ- 
 ence on the Greeks generally. The 
 moral conduct of the initiated was no 
 better than that of others; and Plato 
 thought that participation in the Ele- 
 usinia served only to strengthen and 
 make a man secure in jinrighteous- 
 ness.f 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 RELIGION OF THE ANCIENT ROMANS. 
 
 " Sua cuique religio civitati, nostra tiobis." 
 
 CICERO, Pro Flacc. 28. 
 
 . 
 
 196. TIME was, and not a very dis- 
 tant time, when it was regularly Incul- 
 cated on the youthful mind in our pub- 
 lic schools and other great educational 
 establishments, that one and the same 
 religious system prevailed alike in 
 Italy and Greece, among the Romans 
 and the Hellenes; two branches, as 
 it was thought, of a single original 
 people. Such phrases as " classical 
 mythology," " the religion of the 
 Greeks and Romans," " the deities of 
 the classical nations," were frequent 
 alike on the lips of teachers, and in 
 the language of authorized text-books ; 
 the Grecian divinities were spoken of 
 almost universally by their (supposed) 
 equivalent Latin names ; and the 
 youth would have been considered 
 offensively pedantic who should have 
 hesitated to render "iipi by "Juno," 
 or ^fifjrrjp by "Ceres." But within 
 the last twenty or thirty years a more 
 jus-t appreciation of the facts of the 
 
 * Dollinger, " Jew and Gentile," vol. i. p. 196. 
 t " Republic," ii. 6 (quoted by Dollinger, 
 p. 200). 
 
 case has sprung up ; the careful in- 
 vestigation which has been made of 
 the " origines " both of Greece and 
 Rome has shown, first, that the two 
 nations were but remotely connected 
 in race, and secondly, that their re- 
 ligious systems were markedly and 
 strikingly different. Any review of 
 the religious systems of the ancient 
 world that is attempted at the present 
 day, necessarily and as a matter of 
 course, treats separately the religion 
 of the Hellenes and that of the Ro- 
 mans ; and we are thus bound, be- 
 fore our task can be regarded as com- 
 plete, to append to the account which 
 we have already given of the Hellenic 
 religious system a chapter on the 
 " Religion of the Ancient Romans." 
 
 197. Following the method which 
 we have hitherto for the most part 
 pursued, we propose to consider, 
 first, the objects of worship at Rome, 
 and secondly, the character and pe- 
 culiarities of the worship which was 
 paid to them. We may note, en pass- 
 ant, that the religion was a polytheism, 
 in its general character similar to that 
 of Greece, but distinguished by its 
 comparatively scanty development of 
 the polytheistic idea in respect of Na- 
 ture and the parts of Nature, and its 
 ample development of that idea in 
 connection with human life, its actions, 
 parts, and phases. 
 
 198. The great gods (Di majores) 
 of Rome were always regarded as 
 twelve in number, though at different 
 periods of Roman history the enu- 
 meration of " the twelve " would have 
 been different. If we go back to the 
 very earliest almost pre-historic 
 time, we may perhaps name the 
 following as ** the twelve " of the 
 primitive system Jupiter, Juno 
 (= Diana), Minerva, Mars, Bellona, 
 Vesta, Ceres, Saturnus7~ Ops, "Her- 
 cules, Mercurius, Neptune. A few 
 words must be said concerning each 
 of these. 
 
 JUPITER. 
 
 199. The Jupiter (jv- PATER), or 
 " Father Jove," of the Romans bore 
 a real resemblance to the Greek Zeus, 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [159] Bi 
 
 with whose name he is etymologically 
 identical.* The idea of paternity, 
 attached to his name in ordinary par- 
 lance, implied the same notion which 
 we find in the Hellenic system, viz., 
 that he was " the father of gods and 
 men " (hominum sator atque deorum, 
 Virg.). He had a temple from the 
 very earliest times on the Capitoline 
 hill, where he was worshiped in 
 combination with Juno and Minerva, 
 and a High Priest, the " Flamen 
 Dialis," who maintained his cult with 
 perpetual burnt sacrifice. Originally, 
 there must have been in the concep- 
 tion of Jupiter a latent monotheism ; 
 but long before the first settlement 
 was made by any Latins in Italy, this 
 idea seems to have evaporated ; and 
 to the Romans of the earliest times 
 whereof we have any trace, Jove was 
 no more than one god out of many f 
 the god, especially, of the air, the 
 sky, the firmament who sent down 
 lightning from above, gave rain, di- 
 rected the flight of birds, and (as Ve- 
 Jovis) impregnated the atmosphere 
 with fevers and pestilence. He was 
 the acknowledged head of the Roman 
 pantheon, only preceded sometimes 
 in solemn invocations $ by Janus, 
 "the spirit of opening," who neces- 
 sarily presided over beginnings of all 
 kinds. A sort of general superintend- 
 ence over human affairs was assigned 
 to him ; he was viewed as punishing 
 impiety in general, and perjury in par- 
 ticular ; he knew the future, and could 
 reveal it ; he guarded the rights of 
 property, and was viewed as a sort of 
 guardian deity of the Roman people 
 and state. He has been called, "the 
 genius of the Roman people ; " but 
 this conception of him is too nar- 
 row. He was certainly much more 
 than that. If not the " universal lord," 
 
 * Both names are, of course, closely allied 
 to the Sanskrit " Dyaus," " heaven," or " the 
 sky." (See Max Muller, " Science of Re- 
 ligion," p. 172.) 
 
 t This is applied in the ordinary append- 
 age to his name, " Optimus maximus," "the 
 best and greatest " (of the gods). 
 
 J Liv. viii. 9 
 
 Mommsen, " History of Rome." vol. i. 
 p, 176, E. T. 
 
 which some have considered him, he 
 was at any rate a great god t 
 highest conception of deiti/Whieh 
 ever reached by the Rom 
 
 JUNO. 
 
 200. Juno is a mere female Jupiter, 
 possessing no substantive or separate 
 character, unless it be that of a spe- 
 cial protectress of women, and more 
 particularly of matrons. She stands 
 to Jupiter as Fauna to Faunus, Luna to 
 Lunus, Amente to Ammon. She pre- 
 sided especially over marriages and 
 births, being invoked as * Lucina," 
 or " she that brings to light," when 
 the birth drew nigh, and as " Pro- 
 nuba" when marriage approached. 
 Identical with Diana originally (for 
 Diana is to A/df as Juno to z^f), she 
 came gradually to be considered a 
 distinct and separate deity the dis- 
 tinction becoming a contrast in the 
 later times, when Diana was identi- 
 fied with the Grecian Artemis. As 
 Jupiter was the " king," so Juno was 
 the " queen of heaven " (regina ca>li 
 or cceloruni). She was invoked 
 tinder many names besides those 
 already mentioned. She was 
 " Virginalis," as protecting maidens ; 
 " Matrona," as the patroness of 
 married women ; " Opigena," " help- 
 giving ; " and " Sospita," " preserv- 
 ing," as general aider of the female 
 sex. A great festival was held in 
 her honor every year on the ist 
 of March, which was called Matro- 
 nalia, and was attended by all Roman 
 matrons, who regarded her as at her 
 pleasure either giving or withholding 
 offspring. It was perhaps an accident 
 which gave Juno the presidency over 
 money, the Romans having found it 
 convenient to establish their first mint 
 in the vicinity of her temple on the 
 Capitoline hill, where she was wor- 
 shiped as Juno Moneta, or " Juno 
 the admonitress." 
 
 MINERVA. 
 
 2oi. Minerva, though worshiped 
 n common by the Etruscans and the 
 
82 [160] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 Romans, appears by the etymology 
 of her name to have been essentially 
 a Latin deity. She is the goddess of 
 mind (metis) and memory (memini, re- 
 miniscor) u the thinking, calculating, 
 inventive power personified." * Her 
 worship was closely connected with 
 that of Jupiter and Juno, the three 
 together forming the Capitoline Triad, 
 who alone had temples on that hill in 
 the early times. In the great lectis- 
 ternium called epulumjovis, the images 
 of the three were brought out and 
 feasted together. Minerva was the 
 patroness both of the fine arts and of 
 the various handicrafts the goddess 
 of sculptors, painters, musicians, poets, 
 .physicians, weavers, dyers, carpenters, 
 smiths, etc., etc. Each man regarded 
 his talents as coming especially from 
 her ; and as success in war is the fruit 
 of prudence, perseverance, contriv- 
 ance, stratagem, as much as of courage 
 and sheer brute force, Minerva was 
 in one respect f a war-goddess, and 
 represented with a helmet, shield, and 
 coat of mail. The chief festival cele- 
 brated in honor of Minerva was the 
 Quin quatrus or Quinquatria, which 
 lasted five days from the iQth of 
 March to the 2^d. 
 
 MARS. 
 
 202. In Mavors or Mars we have 
 "the central object, not only of Ro- 
 man, but Italian, worship in gen- 
 eral " $ -the real main object of 
 public religious regard throughout the 
 greater portion of the peninsula. 
 Originally, perhaps, Maurs (Mors), 
 " the killing god," and therefore, like 
 Siva the Destroyer, attached to no 
 special department of human life, he 
 came by degrees to have the most de- 
 structive of human occupations, war, 
 assigned to him as his especial field, 
 and to be regarded as the god who 
 went out to battle at the head of each 
 
 army invisibly but really present 
 who hurled his spear at the foe, struck 
 terror into them, disordered their 
 ranks, and gave to his worshipers the 
 victory. Practically ousting Jupiter 
 from the regards of men, he became 
 j Marspiter* (Maspiter, " Father Mars," 
 j the god to whom alone they looked 
 | for protection). The first month of 
 j the year was dedicated to him, and 
 | thence took the name which it bears 
 ! in most modern European languages. 
 I The great muster-ground of the peo- 
 ! pie before they went out to war 
 became the " Campus Martins ; " and 
 war itself was sometimes designated 
 by his name, as intellectual ability was 
 by that of Minerva. As marching at 
 the head of Roman troops, he was 
 j called Gradivus, as avenging them 
 | upon their enemies, Uttor. Like Ju- 
 I piter, he had his High Priest the 
 " Flamen Martialis " whose business 
 it was to present to him burnt offer- 
 j ings. He had also attached to his 
 I worship from very ancient times a col- 
 1 lege of priests known as Salii 
 
 
 * Schmidt, in Dr. Smith's " Diet, of Greek 
 and Roman Antiquities," vol. ii. p. 1090. 
 
 t So Mommsen, " History of Rome," vol. 
 i. p. 175, E. T. 
 
 J So Momir:S2n, " History of Rome," vol. 
 i. p. 175, E. T. 
 
 " dancers "), who performed war- 
 | dances in his honor, clad in ar- 
 mor, and carrying the sacred shields 
 supposed to have fallen from 
 heaven, and called ancilia. The wolf, 
 the horse, and the woodpecker were 
 sacred to him. A great festival was 
 held in his honor at the beginning of 
 each year, commencing on the ist 
 March. 
 
 BELLONA. 
 
 203. Bellona, or Duellona,f stood to 
 Mars as Juno to Jupiter, except that 
 there was no etymological connection 
 between the names. She was the 
 goddess of war (be Hum or duelling 
 was spoken of as the wife or sister of 
 Mars, and had a temple in the Cam- 
 pus Martius, where the ceremony of 
 proclaiming war was performed. A 
 college of priests, called Bellonarii, 
 conducted her worship, and were 
 bound, when they offered sacrifice in 
 
 * Liv. viii. 9. 
 
 t Fabretti, " Corpus Inscr. Italicarum," p. 
 
 3 2 3- 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [161J 
 
 her honor, to wound their own arms 
 or legs, and either to offer up upon 
 her altar the blood which flowed from 
 their wounds, or else to swallow it 
 themselves. The 24th of March was 
 especially appointed for these cere- 
 monies, and for this reason was known 
 in the Roman calendar as the " day 
 of blood " (dies sanguinis). Bellona 
 was represented as armed with a 
 bloody scourge,* and was solemnly 
 invoked in dangerous crises by gen- 
 erals on the battle field, t 
 
 VESTA, 
 
 
 204. Vesta, identical with the Gre- 
 cian Hestia (* EGTEO), was an ancient 
 goddess, whose worship the Latins 
 brought with them into Italy from 
 their primitive settlements in the far 
 East. In her earliest conception, she 
 was the goddess of the human dwell- 
 ing (vas, vasana, Sanskr.) generally : 
 but, according to Roman ideas, it was 
 the national, rather than the domestic, 
 hearth over which she presided. Her 
 temple was one of the most ancient in 
 Rome. It lay at the northern foot of 
 the Palatine hill, a little east of the 
 Forum, and was in the immediate vi- 
 cinity of a sacred grove, also dedi- 
 cated to Vesta. The regular worship 
 of the goddess was entrusted to a col- 
 lege of six women, known as " Vestal 
 Virgins " ( Virgines Vestales), whose 
 special duty it was to preserve the sa- 
 cred fire upon the altar which repre- 
 sented the national hearthstone, and 
 not to allow it ever to be extinguished. 
 They dwelt together in a cloister (atri- 
 um) a little apart from the temple, 
 under the presidency of the eldest 
 sister ( Vestalis maxima) and under the 
 superintendence and control of the 
 college of Pontifices. Besides watch- 
 ing the fire, they had to present offer- 
 ings to Vesta at stated times, and to 
 sprinkle and purify the shrine each 
 morning with water from the Egerian 
 spring. A festival was held in honor 
 of the goddess annually on the Qth of 
 
 * Virgil, " JEn." viii. 703 ; Lucan, " Phars." 
 vii. 569. 
 
 t Liv. viii. 9; x. 19. 
 
 June, at which no man might be pres- 
 ent, but which was attended by the 
 Roman matrons generally, who walked 
 in procession with bare feet from the 
 various quarters of the city to the 
 temple. There was no image in the 
 temple of Vesta, the eternal fire be- 
 ing regarded as symbolizing her suf- 
 ficiently. 
 
 
 
 CERES. 
 
 205. A god, Cerus, and a goddess 
 Cerie, are found to have been wor- 
 shiped by the early Italians ; * and it 
 is a reasonable conjecture that these 
 names are connected with the Latin 
 " Ceres." The Latin writers derived 
 that word either from gero or creoft 
 and considered that it was given to 
 mark that the deity in question was 
 the "bringer," or "creator" of those 
 fruits of the earth on which the life of 
 man mainly depends. According to 
 some, Ceres was the same as Tellus ; 
 but this does not seem to have been 
 the case anciently. Ceres was the 
 goddess of agriculture, and was con- 
 nected from a very early date with 
 Liber, the Latin Bacchus, the god of 
 the vineyard. That Ceres should 
 have been one of the "great divini- 
 ties," marks strongly the agricultural 
 character of the early Roman state, 
 which did not give to Liber, or to Po- 
 mona, any such position. The wor- 
 ship of Ceres merged after a time in 
 that of Demeter, whose peculiar rites 
 were imported either from Velia or 
 from Sicily. 
 
 SATURNUS. 
 
 206. Saturnus was properly the god 
 of sowing, but was regarded, like Ce- 
 res, as a general deity of agriculture, 
 and was represented with a pruning- 
 hook in his hand, and with wool about 
 his feet. His statue was made hollow, 
 
 *Fabretti, "Corpus Ins. Italic." pp. 829, 
 830. 
 
 t Varro (" De Ling. Lat." v. 64), and Cic- 
 ero (" De Nat. Deor." ii. 26), derive it from 
 gero : Servius (" Comm. ad Virg. Georg." i. 
 6), and Macrobius (" Saturn." i. 18) from 
 
84 [162] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 and was filled with olive oil, signifi- 
 cant of the " fatness " and fertility 
 which he spread over the land. His 
 festival, the Saturnalia, held in De- 
 cember, from the lyth to the 24th, 
 was a sort of harvest-home, commem- 
 orative of the conclusion of all the la- 
 bors of the year, and was therefore 
 celebrated with jocund rites, mirth, 
 and festivity, an intermixture of all 
 ranks upon equal terms, and an inter- 
 change of presents. The temple of 
 Saturn at Rome stood at the foot of 
 the Capitoline hill, and was assigned 
 to a remote antiquity, though with 
 variations as to the exact date. It 
 was used as a record office, and also 
 as the public treasury, which was re- 
 garded as mainly rilled by the produce 
 of agricultural industry. The identi- 
 fication of Saturnus with the Grecian 
 Cronus was a foolish fancy of the 
 Hellenizing period, the truth being 
 that " there is no resemblance what- 
 ever between the attributes of the two 
 deities." * 
 
 OPS. 
 
 207. With Saturn must be placed 
 Ops, who was sometimes called his 
 wife, and whose worship certainly 
 stood in a very close connection with 
 his. Ops was properly the divinity 
 of field-labor (opus, opera) ; but as 
 such labor is productive of wealth. 
 Ops came to be also the goddess of 
 plenty and of riches, and her name is 
 the root-element in such words as 
 opimus, opulcntus, inops, and the like. 
 She was generally worshiped to- 
 gether with Saturn, and had temples 
 in common with him ; but still she 
 had her own separate sanctuary on 
 the Capitoline hill,t where honors 
 were paid to her apart from any other 
 deity. Her festival, the Opalia, fell 
 on December i9th, or the third day of 
 the Saturnalia, and was thus practi- 
 cally merged in that of the god of agri- 
 culture. Ops, like Ceres, is some- 
 times confounded with Tellus, but the 
 
 * Schmidt, in Smith's " Diet, of Greek and 
 Roman Biog." vol. iii. p. 726. 
 t Liv. xxxix. 22. 
 
 three goddesses were to the Latin 
 mind distinct, Tellus being a personi- 
 fication of the earth itself, Ceres of 
 the productive power in nature, which 
 brings forth fruits out of the earth, 
 and Ops of the human labor without 
 which the productive power runs to 
 waste, and is insufficient for the suste- 
 nance of human life. 
 
 HERCULES. 
 
 208. The near resemblance of Her- 
 cules to Heracles led, almost neces- 
 sarily, to the idea, everywhere preva- 
 lent until recently, that the two gods 
 were identical, and that therefore 
 either Hercules was an ancient deity 
 common to the Latins with the Hel- 
 lenes before the former migrated into 
 Italy, or else that he was an importa- 
 tion from Greece, introduced at a 
 comparatively late period. Recently, 
 however, the etymological connection 
 of the two names has been question- 
 ed, and it has been suggested * that 
 Hercules is, like Ceres, and Saturn, 
 and Ops, and Mars, and Minerva, a 
 genuine Italic god, quite unconnected 
 with Heracles, who is a genuine Hel- 
 lenic divinity. The root of the name 
 Hercules has been found in hsrcus 
 (epxi) " a fence " or " enclosure," 
 whence hercere or arcere, " to ward off," 
 " keep back," " shield." Hercules, 
 whose worship was certainly as an- 
 cient at Rome as that of any other 
 deity, would thus be " the god of the 
 enclosed homestead," and thence in 
 general " the god of property and 
 gain." f He was regarded as presid- 
 ing over faith, the basis of the social 
 contract, and of all dealings between 
 man and man, and hence was known 
 as Deusfidi-us, " the god of good faith," 
 who avenged infractions of it. In the 
 early times he seems to have had no 
 temple at Rome ; but his Great Altar 
 in the cattle-market was one of the 
 most sacred sites in the city ; $ oaths 
 were sworn there, and contracts con- 
 
 * Mommsen, " History of Rome," vol. i. 
 p. 174. 
 t Ibid. 
 | See Liv. i. 7 ; ix. 29. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [103] 85 
 
 eluded ; nor was it unusual for Roman 
 citizens to devote to it a tenth part of 
 their property, for the purpose of ob- 
 taining the god's favor, or for the 
 fulfillment of a vow. The worship of 
 Hercules was not exclusively Roman, 
 not even Latin, but Italic. He was 
 "reverenced in every spot of Italy, 
 and had altars erected to him every- 
 where, in the streets of the towns as 
 well as by the roadsides." * 
 
 MERCURIUS. 
 
 t 
 
 209. Mercurius was the god of com- 
 merce and traffic generally. As trade 
 was not looked upon with much re- 
 spect at Rome, his position among the 
 " great gods " was a low one. He 
 had no very ancient temple or priest- 
 hood, and, when allowed the honor 
 of a temple in the second decade of 
 the Republic, f his worship seems to 
 have been regarded as plebeian and 
 of an inferior character. Connected 
 with it was a "guild of merchants " $ 
 (collegium mercatoruni), called after- 
 ward, " Mercuriales," who met at the 
 temple on certain fixed days for a relig- 
 ious purpose. The cult of Mercury 
 was, like that of Hercules, very widely 
 diffused ; but it was affected chiefly 
 by the lower orders, and had not much 
 hold upon the nation. 
 
 NEPTUNUS. 
 
 210. The Latin Neptunus is reason- 
 ably identified with the Etruscan 
 Nethuns, who was a water god, wide- 
 ly worshiped by that seafaring people. 
 The word is probably to be connected 
 with the root nib or nip, found in V/TTTW, 
 v<7r7//p, xtp-vtp-a, x- T. 1- There is not 
 much trace of the worship of Neptune 
 at Rome in the early times, for Livy's 
 identification of him with Census, || 
 the god honored in the Consualia, 
 cannot be allowed. We find his cult, 
 
 * Mommsen, 1. s. c. 
 t Liv. ii. 27. 
 
 t Niebuhr, " History of Rome," vol. i. p. 
 589, note, E. T. 
 
 Taylor, " Etruscan Researches," p, 138. 
 U Liv. i. 9. 
 
 . 
 
 however, fully established in the sec- 
 ond century of the Republic,* when 
 it was united with that of Mercury, 
 the mercantile deity. In later times 
 he had an altar in the Circus Flami- 
 nius, and a temple in the Campus 
 Martius. A festival was held in his 
 honor, called Neptunalia, on the 23d 
 day of July, which was celebrated 
 with games, banquets, and carousals. 
 The people made themselves booths N 
 at this time with the branches of trees f : 
 and feasted beneath the pleasant 
 shade of the green foliage. Roman 
 admirals, on quitting port with a fleet,/ 
 were bound to sacrifice to Neptune, 
 and the entrails of the victims were 
 thrown into the sea. After the Greek 
 mythology became known to the Ro- 
 mans, Neptune was completely identi- 
 fied with Poseidon, and became in- 
 vested with all his attributes. Amphi- 
 trite became his wife, and the Nereids 
 his companions. t 
 
 211. In succession to the twelve 
 deities of the first rank may be placed 
 the following important groups : i. 
 The gods of the country : Tellus, or 
 Mother Earth ; Silvanus, god of the 
 woods ; Pomona, goddess of orchards ; 
 Flora, goddess of flowers ; Faunus 
 (" favoring god "), presiding over 
 flocks and herds ; and Vertumnus, 
 god of the changing year (verto). 2. 
 The State gcds : Terminus, god of 
 the boundary ; Census, god of the 
 State's secret counsels ; Quirinus, 
 god of the Qtiirinal and of the Qui- 
 rites, or Roman people ; and the 
 Penates, gods of the State's property 
 (penus). 3. The personifications of 
 abstract qualities : Pietas, goddess of 
 piety ; Fides, of faith ; Spes, of hope ; 
 Pax, of peace abroad ; Concordia, of 
 peace at home ; Libertas, of liberty ; 
 Fortuna, of good luck; Juventas, of 
 youth ; Salus, of health ; Pudicitia, of 
 modesty ; Victoria, of victory ; Cupid, 
 god of desire ; Pavor, of fright ; Pal- 
 lor, of paleness; and the like. 4. 
 The Nature gods : Ccelus, Terra, Sol, 
 Lunus, or Luna, ^sculanus, Argen- 
 
 *Liv. v. 13. 
 
 t Hor. Od. iii. 28, 
 
 10. 
 
86 [164] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 tinus, etc. And 5. The divinities 
 introduced from Greece : Apollo, Bac- 
 chus, Latona, Pluto, Plutus, Proser- 
 pine, Castor, Pollux, yEsculapius, Pria- 
 pus, /Eolus, the Fates, u.e Furies, etc. 
 
 212. To this brief sketch of the 
 chief objects of worship among the 
 ancient Romans, it follows to add 
 some account of the character of the 
 worship itself. 
 
 213. The worship of most of the 
 gods was specially provided for by 
 the State, which established paid 
 priesthoods, to secure the continual 
 rendering of the honors due to each. 
 The highest order of priests bore the 
 name of Flamines, which is thought to 
 mean " kindlers of fire," * />., offerers 
 of burnt sacrifice. The Flamines 
 were of two classes, Majores and 
 Minores, the former of whom were 
 always taken from the patrician order. 
 These were the Flamen Dialis, or 
 "priest of Jove," the Flamen Mar- 
 tialis, or " priest of Mars," and the 
 Flamen Quirinalis, or " priest of Quiri- 
 rms." Among the Flamines Minores, 
 many of whom were of late institution, 
 we find those of Vertumnus, Flora, 
 Pomona, and Vulcan. f The Flamen 
 was in each case the principal sacrific- 
 ing priest in the chief temple of the 
 god or goddess, and was bound to be 
 in continual attendance upon the 
 shrine, and to superintend the entire 
 worship offered at it. - In addition to 
 the Flamen, or in his place, there was 
 attached to all temples a collegium, 
 or body of priests, which might con- 
 sist of all the male members of a par- 
 ticular family, as the Potitii and 
 Pinarii,$ but was more commonly a 
 close corporation, limited in number, 
 and elected by co-optation, *>., by the 
 votes of the existing members. 
 
 214. Among the most important 
 of these corporations were the two 
 collegia of Salii, or" dancing priests," 
 which were attached to the temple of 
 Mars upon the Palatine hill, and to 
 
 * Mommsen, " History of Rome," vol. i. p. 
 
 1 7.5- 
 
 r Ennius ap. Varronem, " De Ling. Lat." 
 viL 44 
 
 | Liv. i. 7- 
 
 that of Quirinus upon the Quirinal. 
 '"Hie former Salii Palatini had the 
 charge ofthe ancilia, or sacred shields, 
 one of which was believed to have 
 fallen from heaven, and to be fatally 
 connected with the safety of the 
 Roman State. In the great festival 
 of Mars, with which the year opened, 
 they marched in procession through 
 the city, bearing the ancilia on their 
 shoulders, and striking them from 
 time to time, as they danced and sang, 
 with a rod. The Salii of Quirinus 
 Salii Collini or Agonales were a less 
 important college. Their duties con- 
 nected them with the worship of 
 Quirinus, who is believed by some to 
 have been the Sabine Mars,* and with 
 the festival of the Quirinalia. Like 
 the other Salii, they no doubt per- 
 formed war-dances in honor of their 
 patron deity. A third collegium, or 
 priestly corporation of high rank, was 
 that of the six Vestal Virgins, at- 
 tached, as their name implies, to the 
 worship of Vesta, and regarded with 
 peculiar veneration, as having vowed 
 themselves to chastity in the service 
 of the nation. Other collegia of some 
 importance, but of a lower rank, were 
 that of the Fratres Arvales, a college 
 of twelve priests attached to the cult 
 of Ceres, who celebrated a festival to 
 her as the Dea dia (divine goddess) 
 in the early summertime ; and that of 
 the Luperci, or " wolf-expellers," a 
 shifting body of persons, whose chief 
 business it was to conduct the Luper- 
 calia, a festival held annually on the 
 1 5th of February, in honor of Luper- 
 cus, or Faunus. The Sodales Titii 
 had duties similar to those of the 
 Fratres Arvales ; and the Flamines 
 Curiales, thirty in number, offered 
 sacrifices for the preservation of the 
 thirty curies of the original Roman 
 people. 
 
 215. From these collegia of priests, 
 we must carefully distinguish the 
 learned corporations, "colleges of 
 sacred lore," as they have been 
 called, f who had no priestly duties, 
 and ho special connection with any 
 
 * Mommsen, vol. i. pp. 87 and 175. 
 t Ibid. pp. 177, 178. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [165] 87 
 
 particular deity. There were four 
 principal colleges of this kind those 
 of the Pontifices, the Augurs, the 
 Fetials, and the Duumviri sacrorum. 
 
 216. The Pontifices, originally four 
 (or five, if we include the pontifex 
 maximus), but afterward raised to 
 nine, and ultimately to sixteen, had 
 the general superintendence of relig- 
 ion. They exercised a control over 
 all the priests, even the Flamens. 
 They were supposed to be thoroughly 
 acquainted with all the traditions 
 with regard to the appropriate worship 
 of each divinity; to understand the 
 mysteries of numbers, and to be 
 deeply versed in astronomy whence 
 they settled the calendar, determin- 
 ing when each festival was to be held, 
 and what days were fasti or nefasti, i.e., 
 days suitable for the transaction of 
 business, or the contrary. All prod- 
 igies and omens had to be reported 
 to them ; and with them it lay to de- 
 termine what steps should be taken to 
 appease the gods in connection with 
 each. They had to furnish the proper 
 formula on all great religious occa- 
 sions, as the dedication of a temple,* 
 the self-devotion of a general,! and 
 the like. There was no appeal from 
 their decisions, unless in some cases 
 to the people ; and they could enforce 
 obedience by the infliction of fines, 
 and, under certain circumstances, of 
 death. 
 
 217. The Augurs, originally four, 
 like the Pontiffs, and raised, like them, 
 first to nine, and later to sixteen, were 
 regarded as possessed especially of 
 the sacred lore connected with birds. 
 Augural birds were limited in number, 
 and were believed to give omens in 
 three ways, by flight, by note, or by 
 manner of feeding. The Augurs 
 knew exactly what constituted a good, 
 and what a bad, omen in all these 
 ways. They were consulted when- 
 ever the State commenced any im- 
 portant business. No assembly could 
 be held, no election could take place, 
 no war could be begun, no consul 
 
 * Liv. i, 46, 
 
 t Ibid. viii. 9 ; x. 28. 
 
 could quit Rome, no site for a new 
 temple could be fixed on, unless the 
 Augurs were present, and pronounced' 
 that the birds gave favorable omens. 
 In war, they watched the feeding of 
 the sacred chickens, and allowed or 
 forbade engagements, according as 
 the birds ate greedily or the contrary. 
 Divination from celestial phenomena, 
 especially thunder and lightning, was, 
 at a comparatively late date, added lo 
 their earlier functions. As their du- 
 ties enabled them to exercise a veto 
 upon laws, and very seriously to in- 
 fluence elections, the office was much 
 sought after by candidates for polit- 
 ical power, and was regarded as one 
 of the highest dignities in the State.* 
 
 218. The Fetials, a college of 
 (probably) twenty persons, were the 
 living depositary of international law 
 and right. All the treaty obligations 
 of Rome and her neighbors were 
 supposed to be known to them, and 
 it was for them to determine when a 
 war could be justly undertaken, and 
 what reparation should be demanded 
 for injuries. Not only did they fur^ 
 nish the forms for demanding satis- 
 faction, f declaring war,$ and making 
 peace, but their own personal inter- 
 vention was requisite in every case. 
 Invested with a sacred character, they 
 were the intermediaries employed by 
 the State in making complaints, pro- 
 claiming war. and seeing that treaties 
 were concluded with the proper for- 
 malities. In the conclusion of such 
 engagements they even acted as 
 veritable priests, slaying with their 
 own hands the victims, by -offering 
 which a sacred character was given to 
 treaty obligations. 
 
 219. The Duumviri sacrorum were 
 the keepers, consulters, and inter- 
 preters of the Sibylline books, a col- 
 lection of pretended prophecies, 
 written in Greek, and no doubt derived 
 from a Greek source. They were, 
 as their name implies, a collegium of 
 
 * Cic. De Leg. ii. 12. 
 1 Liv. i. 32. 
 
 \Ibid. 
 
 Ibid. i. 24. 
 
88 [160] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 two persons only,* and in the early 
 times were required 10 be Romans of 
 a very high rank. As such persons, 
 not unfrequently, were very ignorant of 
 the Greek, the State furnished them 
 with two slaves well acquainted with 
 the language. It was customary to 
 consult the Sibylline books in case of 
 pestilence, or of any extraordinary 
 prodigy, and to follow scrupulously 
 the advice which they were thought to 
 give in reference to the occasion. 
 
 220. Such were the learned colleges 
 of ancient Rome. Though exercising 
 considerable political influence, they 
 never became dangerous to the State, 
 from the circumstance that they 
 could in no case take the initiative. 
 Their business was to give answers to 
 inquirers ; and, until consulted, they 
 were dumb. Private persons as well 
 ras public officers might appeal to 
 jtheiii ; and calls were frequently made 
 on them to bring forth their secret 
 
 knowledge into the light of day by the 
 magistrates. But it was of their es- 
 -.serice to be consultative, and not in- 
 itiative, or even executive bodies. 
 Hence, notwithstanding the powers 
 which they wielded, and the respect 
 in which they were held, they at no 
 time became a danger to the State. 
 Sacerdotalism plays no part in Roman 
 history. " Notwithstanding all their 
 .zeal for religion, the Romans adhered 
 with unbending strictness to the prin- 
 ciple, that the priest ought to remain 
 completely powerless in the State, 
 and, excluded from command, ought, 
 .like any other burgess, to render 
 -obedience to the humblest magis- 
 :trate."f 
 
 221. The public religion of the Ro- 
 mans consisted, mainly, in the observ- 
 ance by the .-State of its obligation 
 
 '(religio) to provide for the cult of 
 certain traditional deities, which it did 
 by building temples, establishing 
 priesthoods, and securing the continu- 
 .ance of both by endowments. Fur- 
 
 *The office was subsequently expanded in- 
 to that of the decemviri sacris faciundis, who 
 ultimately became quindecimviri. 
 
 t Mommsen, " History of Rome," vol. i. p. 
 180. 
 
 ther, the State showed a constant 
 sense of religion by the position which 
 it assigned to augury, and the con- 
 tinual need of " taking the auspices " 
 on all important civil occasions. In 
 declaring war, religious formulas were 
 used ; in conducting it, the augurs, or 
 their subordinates, were frequently 
 consulted ; in bringing it to an end 
 and establishing peace, the fetials had 
 to be called in, and the sanction thus 
 secured to each pacific arrangement. 
 The great officers of the State were in- 
 ducted into their posts with religious 
 solemnities, and were bound to attend 
 and take their part in certain proces- 
 sions and sacrifices. In times of dan- 
 ger and difficulty the State gave orders 
 for special religious ceremonies, to 
 secure the favor of the gods, or avert 
 their wrath. 
 
 222. The religion of the mass of 
 the people consisted principally in 
 four things : i. Daily offerings by 
 each head of a household (^paterfa- 
 milias) to the Lares of his own house. 
 The Lares were viewed as household 
 gods, who watched over each man's 
 hearth and home, each house having 
 its own special Lares. In theory they 
 were the spirits of ancestors, and their 
 chief, the Lar f amiliaris, was the spirit 
 of the first ancestor, the originator of 
 the family ; but practically the ances- 
 tral idea was not prominent. In re- 
 spectable houses there was always a 
 lararium,* or " lar-chapel," containing 
 the images of the Lares ; and each re- 
 ligious Roman commenced the day 
 with prayer in this place, accompany- 
 ing his prayer, upon most occasions, 
 with offerings, which were placed be- 
 fore the images in little dishes (pafellce). 
 The offerings were continually re- 
 newed at meal-times; and on birth- 
 days and other days of rejoicing the 
 images were adorned with wreaths, 
 and the lararia were thrown open. 
 2. Occasional thank-offerings to par- 
 ticular gods from persons who thought 
 
 * The Emperor Alexander Severus had 
 two lararia, and included among the Lares 
 of the one, Abraham. Orpheus, Alexander 
 the Great, and Christ; among those of the 
 other, Achilles, Cicero, and Virgil. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [167] 89 
 
 they had been favored by them. 
 These were carried to the temples by 
 the donors, and made over to the 
 priests, who formally offered them, 
 with an accompaniment of hymns and 
 prayers. 3. Vows and their perform- 
 ance. To obtain a particular favor 
 from a god supposed to be capable of 
 granting it, a Roman was accustomed 
 to utter a vow, by which he bound 
 himself to make the god a certain 
 present, in case he obtained his desire. 
 The present might be a temple, or an 
 altar, or a statue, or a vase, or any 
 other work of art, but was almost al- 
 ways something of a permanent char- 
 acter. The Roman, having made his 
 vow, and got his wish, was excessively 
 scrupulous in the discharge of his 
 obligation, which he viewed as of the 
 most binding character. 4. Attend- 
 ance at religious festivals the Car- 
 mentalia, Cerealia, Compitalia, Con- 
 sualia, Floralia, Lemuralia, Luper : 
 calia, etc. This attendance was in no 
 sense obligatory, and was viewed 
 rather as pleasure than duty the 
 festivals being usually celebrated with 
 games (Ju //) and other amusements. 
 
 223. Upon the whole, the Roman 
 religion, as compared with others, 
 and especially with that of the Greeks, 
 strikes us as dull, tame, and matter- 
 of-fact. There is no beauty in it,, no 
 play of the imagination, and very 
 little mystery. It is "of earth, 
 earthy." Its gods are not great 
 enough, or powerful enough, to im- 
 press the mind of the worshiper with a 
 permanent sense of religious awe- 
 they do not force the soul to bow 
 down before them in humility and 
 self-abasement. The Roman believes 
 in gods, admits that he receives bene- 
 fits from them, allows the duty of 
 gratitude, and, as a just man, punctu- 
 ally discharges the obligations of his 
 religion.* But his creed is not ele- 
 vating it does not draw him on to 
 another world it does not raise in 
 him any hopes of the future. Like 
 
 * Note the idea of obligation as predomi- 
 nant in the word " religion," from re and lego 
 ) " to bind " or " tie." 
 
 the Sadducee, he thinks that God re- 
 wards and punishes men, as He does 
 nations, in this life ; his thoughts 
 rarely turn to another; and if they 
 do, it is with a sort of shiver at the 
 prospect of becoming a pale shade, 
 haunting the neighborhood of the 
 tomb, or dwelling in the cold world 
 beneath, shut out from the light of 
 day. 
 
 224. If the Roman religion may be 
 said to have had anywhere a deeper 
 character than this to have been 
 mysterious, soul-stirring, awful it 
 was in connection with the doctrine of 
 expiation. In the bright clime of Italy, 
 and in the strong and flourishing Ro- 
 man community, intensely conscious 
 of its own life and vigor, the gods 
 could not but be regarded predomi- 
 nantly as beneficent beings, who 
 showered blessings upon mankind. 
 But occasionally, under special cir- 
 cumstances, a different feeling arose. 
 Earthquakes shook the city, and left 
 great yawning gaps in its streets or 
 squares; the Tiber overflowed its 
 banks, and -inundated all the low re- 
 gions that lay about the Seven Hills ; 
 pestilence broke out, destroying 
 thousands, and threatening to carry 
 off the entire people; or the fortune 
 of war hung in suspense, nay, even 
 turned against the warrior nation. 
 At such times a sense of guilt arose, 
 and pressed heavily on the con- 
 sciences of the Romans ; they could 
 not doubt that Heaven was angry with 
 them ; they did not dare to dispute 
 that the Divine wrath was provoked 
 by their sins. Then sacrifice, which 
 in Rome was generally mere thank- 
 offering, took the character of atone- 
 ment or expiation. The gods were 
 felt to require a victim, or victims ; 
 and something must be found to con- 
 tent them something of the best and 
 dearest that the State possessed. 
 What could this be but a human sacri- 
 fice ? Such a sacrifice might be either 
 voluntary or involuntary. Enhanced 
 by the noble quality of patriotic 
 self-abnegation, a single victim suf- 
 ficedmore especially if he were of 
 the best and noblest a young pa.tri- 
 
00 [168] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 clan of high promise, like Marcus 
 Curtius,* or an actual consul, like 
 the Decii.f Without this quality 
 there must be several victims either 
 a sacred and complete number, like 
 the thirty, once offered annually at 
 the Lemuralia, whereof the thirty rush 
 dolls thrown yearly into the Tiber 
 were a reminiscence, or else an in- 
 definite number, such as the gods 
 themselves might determine on, as 
 when a " ver sacrum " was pro- 
 claimed, and all offspring, both of 
 men and of sacrificial cattle, pro- 
 duced within the first month of open- 
 ing spring (Aprilis), were devoted to 
 death and sacrificed to avert God's 
 wrath from the nation. $ 
 
 225. The mythological fables in 
 which the Greeks indulged from a 
 very early date were foreign to the 
 spirit of the Romans, who had no 
 turn for allegory, and regarded the 
 gods with too much respect and fear 
 to invent tales about them. No tra- 
 ditional accounts of the dealings of 
 the gods one with another gave a 
 divine sanction to immorality, or pre- 
 vented the Romans from looking up 
 to their divinities as at once greater 
 and better than themselves. The 
 moral law was recognized as an ac- 
 cepted standard with them, and its 
 vindication whenever it was trans- 
 gressed rested with the deity within 
 whose special sphere the offense was 
 conceived to fall. Hercules avenged 
 broken faith ; Ops and Ceres punished 
 the lazy cultivator ; ill-conducted ma- 
 trons incurred the anger of Juno ; 
 the violation of parental or filial duty 
 fell under the cognizance of Jupiter. 
 Whenever conduct was felt to be 
 wrong, yet the civil law visited the 
 misconduct with no penalty, the dis- 
 pleasure of the gods supplemented the 
 legal defect, and caused the offender 
 in course of time to meet with due 
 punishment. Their belief on this 
 head was, in part, the effect, but it 
 
 * Liv. vii. 6. 
 
 t Ibid. vi ; . 9; x. 28. 
 
 \. See Fe6tus, sub voc. "Ver sacrum," 
 and compare Liv. xxiii. 9, 10; xxxiv. 44; 
 Servius ad Virg. /En. vii. 796, etc. 
 
 was also, in part, the cause of those 
 profound moral convictions which dis- 
 tinguished the Romans among ancient 
 nations. They were deeply impressed 
 with the reality of moral distinctions, 
 and convinced that sin was in all cases 
 followed by suffering. The stings of 
 conscience received increased force 
 and power from the belief in a Divine 
 agency that seconded the judgments, 
 of conscience, and never failed" to 
 punish offenders. 1 * 
 
 226. It is not the object of the 
 present work to trace the changes 
 which came in course of time over the 
 Roman religion, or even to note the 
 corrupting influences to which it was 
 exposed. The subject of "Ancient 
 Religions " is so large a one, that we 
 have felt compelled to limit ourselves 
 in each of our portraitures to the pre- 
 sentation of the religion in a single 
 aspect, that, namely, which it wore at 
 the full completion of its* natural and 
 national development. To do more, 
 to trace each religion historically from 
 its first appearance to its last phase, 
 would require as many chapters as we 
 have had pages at our disposal. The 
 influence of religions upon each other 
 is a matter of so much difficulty, 
 delicacy, and occasional complexity, 
 that it would necessitate discussions 
 of very considerable length. An ex- 
 haustive work on the history of relig- 
 ions would have to embrace this am- 
 ple field, and must necessarily run to 
 several volumes. In the present se- 
 ries of sketches, limited as we have 
 been as to space, we have attempted 
 no more than the fringe of a great 
 subject, and have sought to awaken 
 the curiosity of our readers rather 
 than to satisfv it. 
 
 CONCLUDING REMARKS. 
 
 227. IT has been maintained in 
 the " Introduction " to this work, that 
 the time is not yet come for the con- 
 struction of a " Science of Religion," 
 
 * Hor. Od. iii. 2, 11. 31, 32 ; Tibull. Carm. 
 i. 9, 1. 4. 
 
THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 [169] 91 
 
 and that the present need is rather to 
 accumulate materials, out of which 
 ultimately such a science may perhaps 
 be evolved. Still, the accumulation 
 of materials naturally suggests certain 
 thoughts of a more general character; 
 and the spirit of the Baconian phi- 
 losophy does not forbid the drawing 
 of inferences from groups of phe- 
 nomena even while the greater por- 
 tion of the phenomena are unknown 
 or uninvestigated. While, therefore, 
 we abstain from basing any positive 
 theory upon a survey of religions 
 which is confessedly incomplete, we 
 think that certain negative conclusions 
 of no little interest may be drawn even 
 from the data now before us ; and 
 these negative conclusions it seems to 
 be our duty to lay before the reader, 
 at any rate for his consideration. 
 
 228. In the first place, it seems 
 impossible to trace back to any one 
 fundamental conception, to any innate 
 idea, or to any common experience 
 or observation, the various religions 
 which we have been considering. 
 The veiled monotheism of Egypt, the 
 dualism of Persia, the shamanism of 
 Etruria, the pronounced polytheism 
 of India, are too contrariant, too ab- 
 solutely unlike, to admit of any one 
 explanation, or to be derivatives from 
 a single source. The human mind 
 craves unity ; but Nature is wonder- 
 fully complex. The phenomena of 
 ancient religions, so far as they have 
 been investigated, favor the view that 
 religions had not one origin, but sev- 
 eral distinct origins. 
 
 229. Secondly, it is clear that from 
 none of the religions here treated of 
 could the religion of the ancient He- 
 brews have originated. The Israelite 
 people at different periods of its his- 
 tory came, and remained for a con- 
 siderable time, under Egyptian, Baby- 
 lonian, and Persian influence ; and 
 there have not been wanting persons 
 of ability who have regarded "Juda- 
 ism " as a mere offshoot from the 
 religion of one or other of these three 
 peoples. But, with the knowledge 
 that we have now obtained of the re- 
 ligions in question, such views have 
 
 been rendered untenable, if not hence- 
 forth impossible. Judaism stands out 
 from all other ancient religions, as a 
 thing sui generis, offering the sharpest 
 contrast to the systems prevalent in 
 the rest of the East, and so entirely 
 different from them in its spirit and 
 its essence that its origin could not 
 but have been distinct and separate. 
 
 230. Thirdly, the sacred Books of 
 the Hebrews cannot possibly have 
 been derived from the sacred writings 
 of any of these nations. No contrast 
 can be greater than that between the 
 Pentateuch and the " Ritual of the 
 Dead," unless it be that between the 
 Pentateuch and the Zendavesta, or 
 between the same work and the Vedas. 
 A superficial resemblance may per- 
 haps be traced between portions of 
 the Pentateuch and certain of the 
 myths of ancient Babylon ; but the 
 tone and spirit of the two are so 
 markedly different, that neither can 
 be regarded as the original of the 
 other. Where they approach most 
 nearly, as in the accounts given of 
 the Deluge, while the facts recorded 
 are the same, or nearly the same, the 
 religious standpoint is utterly un- 
 like.* 
 
 231. Fourthly, the historic review 
 which has been' here made lends no 
 support to the theory, that there is a 
 uniform growth and progress of re- 
 ligions from fetishism to polytheism, 
 from polytheism to monotheism, and 
 from monotheism to positivism, as 
 maintained by the followers of Comte. 
 None of the religions here described 
 shows any signs of having been de- 
 veloped out of fetishism, unless it be 
 the shamanism of the Etruscans. In 
 most of them the monotheistic idea is 
 most prominent at the first, and grad- 
 ually becomes obscured, and gives 
 way before a polytheistic corruption. 
 In all there is one element, at least, 
 which appears to be traditional, viz., 
 sacrifice, for it can scarcely have been 
 by the exercise of his reason that man 
 
 * Compare above, pp. 25-26; and see the 
 Author's Essay in "Aids to Faith." Essay 
 vi., pp. 275, 276. 
 
2 [170] 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 came so generally to believe that the 
 superior powers, whatever they were, 
 would be pleased by the violent death 
 of one or more of their creatures. 
 
 232. Altogether, the theory to which 
 the facts appear on the whole to point, 
 is the existence of a primitive religion, 
 communicated to man from without, 
 whereof monotheism and expiatory 
 sacrifice were parts, and, the gradual 
 clouding over of this primitive revela- 
 tion everywhere, unless it were among 
 the Hebrews. Even among them a 
 worship of Teraphim crept in (Gen. 
 xxxi. 19-35), together with other cor- 
 ruptions (Josh. xxiv. 14); and the ter- 
 rors of Sinai were needed to clear 
 away polytheistic accretions. Else- 
 where degeneration had free play. 
 " A dark cloud stole over man's orig- 
 inal consciousness of the Divinity ; 
 and, in consequence of his own guilt, 
 an estrangement of the creature from 
 the one living God took place ; man, 
 as under the overpowering sway of 
 sense and sensual lust, proportionally 
 weakened, therefore, in his moral 
 freedom, was unable any longer to 
 conceive of the Divinity as a pure, 
 spiritual, supernatural, and infinite 
 Being, distinct from the world, and 
 exalted above it. And thus it followed 
 inevitably, that, with his intellectual 
 horizon bounded and confined within 
 the limits of nature, he should seek to 
 
 satisfy the inborn necessity of an ac- 
 knowledgment and reverence of the 
 Divinity by the deification of material 
 nature ; for even in its obscuration 
 the idea of the Deity, no longer recog- 
 nized, indeed, but still felt and per- 
 ceived, continued powerful ; and, in 
 conjunction with it, the truth struck 
 home, that the Divinity manifested it- 
 self in nature as ever present and in 
 operation."* The cloud was darker 
 and thicker in some places than "in 
 others. There were, perhaps, races 
 with whom the whole of the past be- 
 came a tabula rasa, and all traditional 
 knowledge being lost, religion was 
 evolved afresh out of the inner con- 
 sciousness. There were others which 
 lost a portion, without losing the 
 whole of their inherited knowledge. 
 There were others again who lost 
 scarcely anything ; but hid up the 
 truth in mystic language and strange 
 symbolism. The only theory which 
 accounts for all the facts for the 
 unity as well as the diversity of An- 
 cient Religions, is that of a primeval 
 revelation, variously corrupted through 
 the manifold and multiform deterio- 
 ration of human nature in different 
 races and places. 
 
 65. 
 
 Dollinger, "Jew and Gentile," vol. L p. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 The reference is to the paragraphs. 
 
 Aratus quoted, 169 
 Asherahs, 143 
 
 ASSYRIANS AND BABYLONI- 
 ANS: 
 
 Astral Deities, 57-63 
 Belief in a future life, 66 
 Deities : 
 
 Anata, or Anat, 56 
 
 Anu, 44, 45 
 
 Asshur, 40-43 
 
 Bel, 45, 46 
 
 Bilat, 56 
 
 Dav-kina, 56 
 
 Gula, or Anunit, 56 
 
 Hea, or Hoa, 45, 46 
 
 II, or Ra, 39 
 
 Ishtar, 61, 62, 73 
 
 Merodach, 58, 59 
 
 Nebo, 62 
 
 Nergal, 60 
 
 Nin, or Bar, 57, 58 
 
 Shala, or Tala, 56 
 
 Shamas, 51-54 
 
 Sin, 47-50 
 
 Vul, 55 
 
 Lesser gods, 63 
 Legends : 
 
 Creation (Berosus), 69- 
 70 
 
 Deluge, 71-72 
 
 Descent of Ishtar into 
 Hades, 73 
 
 Izdubar, 61 
 
 War in heaven, 68 
 Polytheism, 36-38 
 Prayers, 65 
 Sacrifices, 65 
 Superstitions, 67 
 Temples, 64 
 Triads, 42-55 
 Worship, 64, 65 
 Astronomers, conjectures of, 
 I 
 
 Baal, etymology of, 122 
 Babylon, etymology of, 132 
 Balak quoted, 141 
 Belief in a future life : 
 
 Assyrian and Babylonian, 
 
 Egyptian, 29 
 itruscan, 155, 156 
 Iranian, 90, 91 
 Roman, 223 
 hanskritic Indian, 115 
 
 Bridge of the gatherer, le- 
 gend of, 89 
 
 Bunsen's list of Egyptian 
 Deities, 11 . 
 
 Creation, legend of (Berosus), 
 69 
 
 Dagon, etymology of, 130 
 Darius, sculptures on the 
 
 tomb of, 84 
 
 Degradation of religion, 232 
 Deluge, legends of, 46, 70, 71 
 Dualism of Iranians, 77, qi 
 
 EGYPTIANS, ANCIENT : 
 Belief in a future life, 30 
 Classification of deities, 9 
 Dead, 1 treatment of the, 30 
 Deities : 
 
 Ammon, 13 
 
 Khem, 13 
 
 Kneph, 14 
 
 Neith, or Net, 19 
 . - Osiris, 18 
 
 Phthah, 16 
 
 Ra, 17 
 
 Animal gods, 25, 26, 27 
 
 Nature gods, 22 
 
 Malevolent gods, 23 
 
 Moon gods, 21 
 
 Sun gods, 20 
 
 Bunsen's list of, II . 
 
 Wilkinson's list of, 
 
 n n. 
 
 Embalming, 30 
 Evil, belief in, 34 
 Hymns, 33 
 Polytheism, 9 
 Priests, knowledge of, 33 
 Sacrifices, 28 
 Temples, 28 
 
 Theological system of edu- 
 cated classes, 32-35 
 Tombs, 30 
 Triads, 24, 35 
 Trinity, supposed doctrine 
 
 of . 35 
 
 Worship, 27, 28 
 ETRUSCANS : 
 
 Belief in a future life, 155, 
 
 !5 6 
 
 Deities : 
 
 Charun, 155 
 Cupra, 148 
 
 Mantus and Mania, 155 
 Menrva, or Menrfa, 1 51 
 Tina, or Tinia, 148 
 Usil and Losna, 151 
 Elemental gods, 152 
 Genii, or spirits, 156 
 Lares, the, 160 
 Novensiles, the, 1 54 
 
 Priests, 158 
 
 Sacrifices, 158 
 
 Superstition, 146, 162 
 
 Tombs, 156, 1 60 
 
 Worship, 158 
 Etymologies : 
 
 Ahura-Mazda, 78-80 
 
 Angro-Mainyus, 79, 80 
 
 Baal, 120 
 
 Babylon, 132 
 
 Dagon, 130 
 
 Melchizedek, 122 
 
 Pharaoh, 17 
 
 Sennacherib, 50 
 Eusebius, Extracts from 
 
 " Evangelical Preparation," 
 
 on Phoenician Religion, 118 
 
 Fire, Discovery of, 138 
 
 GREEKS, ANCIENT: 
 Deities : 
 
 Aphrodite, 185 
 
 Apollo, 173 
 
 Ares, 176 
 
 Artemis, 183 
 
 Athene, 182 
 
 Demeter, 187 
 
 Dionysus, 189 
 
 Hades, 191 
 
 Hepiiasstus, 177 
 
 Hera, 181 
 
 Hermes, 178 
 
 Hestia, 186 
 
 Leto, or Latona, 190 
 
 Persephone, 191 
 
 Poseidon, 172 
 
 Zeus, 1 68 
 
 Lesser Gods, 165 
 
 Classification of, 166 
 Festivals, 193 
 Hymns, 192 
 Joyousness of Worship, 
 
 192 
 Legend of the " Lay of the 
 
 Net," 177 
 Nature Worship, 163 
 
04 [172] 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Mysteries, 195 
 Polytheism, 163 
 Prayers, 192 
 Sacrifices, 194 
 Vows, 192 
 Worship, 163, 189 
 
 Hebrews, origin of religion 
 
 of, 229 
 
 Henotheism, 48, 103 
 Hittites or Khita, the God of, 
 
 34 
 Hymns : 
 
 Egyptian, 33 
 Iranian, 76, 85, 92 
 Sanskritic Indian, 112, 115 
 
 Idzubar, legend of, 61 
 IRANIANS: 
 
 Belief in a future life, 89 
 
 Dead, treatment of the, 97 
 
 Deities : 
 
 Ahura-Mazda, So 
 Ahuras, the, 82 
 Angro-Mainyus, 81 
 Amesha-Spentas, the, 
 
 82 
 Devas, the, 82 
 
 Dualism, 77, 91 
 
 Elemental worship, 93 
 
 Fire-worship, 93, 98 
 
 Gathas, extracts from, 92 
 
 Early home of, 74 
 
 Homa, or Haoma, cere- 
 mony of, 85 
 
 Hymns, 76, 85, 92 
 
 Industry, 87 
 
 Legend of the Bridge of 
 the gatherer, 89 
 
 Magism among the, 93-96 
 
 Morality, 91 
 
 Parsees, 76 
 
 Position of man in cosmic 
 scheme, 85 
 
 Prayers, 85 
 
 Priests, Magian, 94, 96 
 
 Purity, 86 
 
 Religion not idolatrous, 83, 
 96 
 
 Resurrection, 90 
 
 Sacrifices, 85, 93 
 
 Veracity, 88 
 
 Water-worship, 93 
 
 Worship, 93-98 
 
 Winged circle, 83 
 
 Zendavesta, the, 76 
 
 Zoroastei", 75 
 Ishtar, descent of, into Hades, 
 
 73 
 
 " Lay of the Net," legend of, 
 177 
 
 Magism, 93-96 
 Melchizedek, etymology of 
 
 122 
 
 Mesa, inscription of, 124' 
 Metals, origin of working in 
 
 133 
 
 Milton quoted, 187 
 Moloch, or Molech, 134 
 
 'OZnone," quotation from, 
 185 
 
 Parsees, 76 
 
 Philo Byblius, works of, 118 
 
 Philologists, comparative, 
 
 views of, i 
 
 PHOENICIANS and CARTHA- 
 GINIANS: 
 
 Asherahs, 143 
 
 Babylon, etymology of, 132 
 
 Bastyli, 143 
 
 Balak quoted, 14 1 
 
 Deities : 
 
 Adonis, or Tammuz, 
 
 A' 3 ' 
 
 Ammon, 139 
 Ashtoreth, or Astarte, 
 
 128 
 
 Baal, 127 
 Baaltis, 135 
 Dagon, 130 
 El, 132 
 Eshmun, 137 
 Kabiri, the, 138 
 Melkarth, 129 
 Moloch, or Molech, 
 
 134 
 
 Osiris, 139 
 Sadyk, 136 
 Shamas, or Shemesh, 
 
 J 34 
 
 Tanith, or Tanath, 139 
 Etymology of names, 121, 
 
 125 
 
 Festivals, 144 
 Licentiousness, 140 
 Original worship monothe- 
 istic, 122-126 
 Pillar worship, 143 
 Polytheism, 120 
 Sacrifices, 141-144 
 Sun-Worship, 133 
 Temples, 143 
 Worship, 131, 140, 148 
 " Poenulus " of Plautus quoted, 
 
 126 
 
 Polytheism : 
 Assyrian and Babylonian, 
 
 Egyptian, 9 
 Greek, 163 
 Phoenician, 120 
 Sanskritic Indian, 99 
 Prayers : 
 Assyrian and Babylonian, 
 
 6 5 
 
 Greek, 192 
 Iranian, 85 
 Roman, 222 
 Sanskritic Indian, 112 
 
 Religion, history of, 3, 5 
 Science of, 4, 227-232 
 Origin of, 227 
 Degradation of, 231 
 
 Resurrection of the body not 
 
 held by the Iranians, 90 
 ROMANS^ ANCIENT : 
 
 Belief in a future life, 223 
 Capitoline Triad, the, 200 
 Classification of Deities, 
 
 198 
 Collegia : the 
 
 Augurs, 217 
 
 Duumviri sacrorum, 
 219 
 
 Fetials, 218 
 
 Pontifices, 216 
 
 Flamines Curiales, 214 
 
 Fratres Arvales, 214 
 
 Luperci, 214 
 
 Salii Collini, or Agon- 
 ales, 214 
 
 Salii Palatini, 214 
 
 Sodales Titii, 214 
 
 Vestal Virgins, 214 
 Deities: 
 
 Ceres, 205 
 
 Hercules, 208 
 
 Juno, 200 
 
 Jupiter, 199 
 
 Mars, 202 
 
 Mercurius, 209 
 
 Minerva, 201 
 
 Neptunus, 210 
 
 Ops, 207 
 
 Saturnus, 206 
 
 Vesta, 204 
 
 Abstract qualities, gods 
 of the, 211 
 
 Country, gods of the, 
 211 
 
 Grecian Gods, 211 
 
 Nature gods, 211 
 
 State, gods of the, 
 211, 213 
 
 Lares, 222 
 Di majores, 198 
 Expiation, doctrine of, 224 
 Festivals, 222 
 Flamines, the, 213 
 Hymns, 222 
 
 Moral law recognized, 225 
 Prayers, 222 
 Priests, 213, 221 
 Religion, character of, 223 
 Sacrifices, 224 
 State religion, 219 
 Thank offerings, 222 
 Vows, 222 
 Worship, 213, 222 
 
 Sacrifices : 
 
 Assyrian and Babylonian, 66 
 
 Egyptian, 29 
 
 Etruscan, 158 
 
 Grecian, 194 
 
 Phoenician and Carthagin- 
 ian, 141-143 
 
 Roman, 224 
 
 Sanskritic Indian, 113 
 SANSKRITIC INDIANS: 
 
 Belief in a future life, 115- 
 117 
 
INDEX, 
 
 [173] 95 
 
 Deities : 
 
 Agni, 105 
 
 Dyaus, 108 
 
 Indra, 104 
 
 Mitra, 104 
 
 Nature gods, 106 
 
 Prithivi, 108 
 
 Soma, no 
 
 Surya, 107 
 
 Ushas, 106 
 
 Varuna, 104 
 
 Vayu, 108 
 
 Lesser gods, 109 
 Fire-worship, 105 
 Henotheism, or Katheno 
 
 theism, 103 
 Hymns, 112, 115 
 Libations, 113 
 Mantras, in 
 Offerings, 113 
 polytheism, 99-103 
 
 Prayers, 112 
 
 Priests, in 
 
 Sacrifices, 113 
 
 Soma plant, no 
 
 Vedic poems, extracts from, 
 
 116 
 
 Worship, 111-114 
 Superstitions : 
 Assyrian and Babylonian, 
 
 67 
 Estruscan, 146, 162 
 
 Temples : 
 Assyrian and Babylonian, 
 
 64 
 
 Egyptian, 28 
 
 Phoenician and Carthagin- 
 ian, 143 
 
 Teraphim, worship of, 232 
 Tombs : 
 
 Egyptian, 30 
 
 Etruscan, 156, 160 
 Trinity, supposed Egyptian 
 doctrine of the, 35 
 
 War in heaven, legend of, 68 
 Wilkinson's list of Egyptian 
 
 deities, n n. 
 Worship : 
 
 Assyrian and Babylonian, 
 64 
 
 Egyptian, 27, 28 
 
 Etruscan, 158 
 
 Grecian, 163, 188, 189 
 
 Iranian, 93-98 
 
 Phoenician and Carthagim- 
 ian, 131, 140 
 
 Roman, 213, 222 
 
 Sanskritic Indian, 1 1 i-i 14 
 
 Zendavesta, the, 76 
 Zoroaster, 75 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 TASK 
 , I 
 
 I. THE RELIGION OF THE ANCIENT EGYPTIANS 2 
 
 II. THE RELIGION OF THE ASSYRIANS AND BABYLONIANS 13 
 
 THE RELIGION OF THE ANCIENT IRANIANS 28 
 
 THE RELIGION OF THE EARLY SANSKRITIC INDIANS 38 
 
 THE RELIGION OF THE PHOENICIANS AND CARTHAGINIANS 48 
 
 THE RELIGION OF THE ETRUSCANS 59 
 
 THE RELIGION OF THE ANCIENT GREEKS 65 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. THE RELIGION OF THE ANCIENT ROMANS So 
 
 CONCLUDING REMARKS. 9 
 
 III. 
 
 IV. 
 
 V. 
 
 VI. 
 
 VII. 
 
 " 
 
 
 

 
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