RELIGION, in its original form, was simple and intelligible. It was intended for the instruction and edification of all ranks of men; and of consequence its doctrines were on a level with vulgar capacities. The Jewish dispensation was openly practised; nothing was performed in secret; every article was plain, open, and accessible. The divine Author of the Christian economy commanded his disciples to preach his doctrine in the most public manner: "What ye have heard in secret (says he) preach openly; and what I have taught you in private teach ye publicly, and proclaim it on the house tops." Such are the charms of truth, and such the character of that religion which came down from heaven, that they, as it were, "delight, and lift up their voice in the streets, and cry in the chief places of concourse."

But such is the depravity of the nature of man, that the noblest institutions degenerate in his hands. Religion itself, originally pure, simple, and amiable, under his management has often been transformed into pollution, perplexity, and deformity. The ministers of religion, whose province it was to guard the sacred deposit, and to secure it from foreign and spurious intermixtures, have generally been the first innovators, and the first and most industrious agents in corrupting its integrity and tarnishing its beauty. Avarice and ambition prompted that class of men to deviate from the original pliancy and simplicity of religious institutions, and to introduce articles, rites, and usages, which might furnish them with opportunities of gratifying these unhallowed and insatiable passions. Hence distinctions unknown to pure and undefiled religion were fabricated; and that heavenly institution, heretofore one, simple, indivisible, was divided into two partitions: the one popular and public; the other dark, secret, and mysterious. The latter of these we intend as the subject of this article.

The English word mystery is derived from the Greek μυστήριον; and in its modern acceptation imports something above human intelligence, something awfully obscure and enigmatical; anything artfully made difficult; the secret of any business or profession. The word is often used by the founder of the Christian religion, and more frequently by his apostles, especially St Paul. In these cases, it generally signifies those doctrines of Christianity which the Jews, prior to the advent of the Messiah, either did not or could not understand. The Trinity in Unity, and the Unity in Trinity; the incarnation of the Son of God; the union of two natures in one and the same person, &c. We generally call mysteries, because they are infinitely above human comprehension. All these significations are out of the question at present. Our intention in this article is Object of to lay before our readers the fullest and fairest account this article, we have been able to collect, of those αποκρύπτα, or secret rites, of the Pagan superstition, which were carefully concealed from the knowledge of the vulgar, and which are universally known under the denomination of mysteries.

The word μυστήριον is evidently deduced from πυργίζειν; but the origin of this last term is not altogether so obvious. The etymologies of it exhibited by the learned are various; some of them absurd and inconceivable, others foolish and futile. Instead of fatiguing our readers with a detail of these, which would be equally unentertaining and uninteresting, we shall only produce one, which to us appears to come nearest the truth. The mysteries under consideration at present were certainly imported into Greece from the east. In those regions, then, we ought of course to look for the etymology of the word. מיסור, or misfur, in Hebrew, signifies "any place or thing hidden or concealed." As this word implies a kind of definition of the nature of the thing intended, and as it is one of the excellencies of original languages to apply vocables with this propriety, we find ourselves strongly inclined to assign the word misfur as the root of the term μυστήριον, mystery.

We have already observed, that the avarice and ambition of the Pagan priesthood probably gave birth to the introduction of the mysteries. To this observation we may now add, that the ministers of that superstition might possibly imagine, that some articles of their ritual were too profound to be comprehended by the vulgar; others, too sacred to be communicated to a description of men, whom the institutions of civil society had placed in a situation not only subordinate but even contemptible. It was imagined, that things sacred and venerable would have contracted a taint and pollution by an intercourse with fond and untutored souls. These appear to us the most probable motives for making that odious and pernicious distinction between the popular religion and that contained in the sacred and mysterious ritual.

The learned Bishop Warburton is positive, that the mysteries of the Pagan religion were the invention of legislators* and other great personages, whom fortune or their own merit had placed at the head of those civil societies which were formed in the earliest ages in different parts of the world. It is with reluctance, and indeed indeed with diffidence, that we presume to differ in our sentiments from such respectable authority. Whatever hypothesis this prelate had once adopted, so extensive was his reading, and so exuberant his intellectual resources, that he found little difficulty in defending it by an appearance of plausibility, if not of rational argumentation. The large quotations he has adduced from Plato and Cicero, do indeed prove that the sages and legislators of antiquity sometimes availed themselves of the influence derived from the doctrines of the mysteries, and from the authority they acquired by the opinion of their having been initiated in them; but that those men were the inventors and fabricators of them is a position for which his quotations do not furnish the most slender presumption. At the same time, we think it not altogether certain, that the doctrine of a divine Providence, and a future state of rewards and punishments, were revealed in the mysteries with all the clearness and cogency which is pretended by his Lordship.

But granting that the fabric was raised by the hands of sages and legislators, we imagine it would be rather difficult to discover what emolument that description of men could propose to derive from the enterprise.—The institution was evidently, and indeed confessedly, devised to conceal from the million those very doctrines and maxims, which had been known and embraced them, would have contributed most effectually to dispose them to submit to those wise regulations which their governors and legislators wished most ardently to establish. Experience has taught, that nothing has a more commanding influence on the minds of the vulgar, than those very dogmas, which, according to the Bishop, were communicated to the initiated. A conviction of the unity of the Deity, of his wisdom, power, goodness, omnipresence, &c., the steady belief of the immortality of the human soul, and of a future state of rewards and punishments, have in all ages, and in all countries, proved the firmest supports of legal authority. The very same doctrines, in the dawn of Christianity, contributed, of all other methods, the most effectually to tame and civilize the savage (A) inhabitants of the northern regions of Europe. Supposing those principles to have been inculcated by the mysteries, the most prudent plan legislators could have adopted, would have been to publish them to all mankind. They ought to have sent forth apostles to preach them to the savages whom they had undertaken to civilize. According to the learned prelate, they pursued the opposite course, and deprived themselves of those very arms by which they might have encountered and overthrown all the armies of vagrism.

Of all the legislators of antiquity, the Cretan alone was prudent enough to see and adopt this rational plan. Diodorus the Sicilian informs us*, that the mysteries of Eleusis, Samothracea, &c., which were elsewhere buried in profound darkness, were among the Cretans taught publicly, and communicated to all the world. Minos, however, was a successful legislator; and his intercourse with Jupiter Ideus extended his influence and established his authority. He was not under the necessity of calling in the mysteries to his assistance: on the contrary, it is highly probable that the universal knowledge of the doctrines of the mysteries among his countrymen, contributed in a considerable degree to facilitate his labour, and ensure his success.

The divine Author of the Christian economy, viewed in the light of a human legislator, saw the propriety of this procedure. Nothing was concealed in his institutions; nothing was veiled with mystery, or buried in darkness. The success was answerable to the wisdom of the plan. The million flocked to the evangelical standard: the gospel was preached to the poor, to the illiterate and the vulgar; and the meanest of mankind eagerly embraced its maxims. Wherever it prevailed, it produced civilization, morality, sobriety, loyalty, and every other private and social virtue.—Upon the supposition that the mysteries had contained and inculcated the principles and practices which the prelate supposes they did, the civilizers of mankind, legislators, magistrates, and princes, ought to have combined to make them public for the sake of their own tranquillity, and the more effectual support of their authority and influence.

Upon the whole, we are inclined to believe that the mysteries were the offspring of Egyptian priesthood. They were instituted with a view to aggrandize the Egyptian order of men, to extend their influence, and enlarge priesthood; their revenues. To accomplish those selfish projects, but they applied every engine towards befogging the multitude with superstition and enthusiasm. They taught them to believe, that themselves were the distinguished favourites of heaven; and that celestial doctrines had been revealed to them, too holy to be communicated to the profane rabble, and too sublime to be comprehended by vulgar capacities. It is, we confess, exceedingly probable, that after the mysteries were instituted, and had acquired an exalted reputation in the world, legislators, magistrates, judges, and potentates, joined in the imposture, with the same views and from the same principles. Princes and legislators, who found their advantage in overpowering and humbling the multitude, readily adopted a plan which they found to be artfully fabricated to answer these very purposes. They had interest enough with the sacerdotal (B) mystagogues, to induce them to allow them to participate in those venerable rites which had already established the authority of that description of men in whose hands they were deposited. The views of both parties were exactly congenial. The respect, the admiration, and dependance on the million, were the ultimate objects of their ambition respectively.—Priests and princes were actuated by the very same spirit. The combination was advantageous, and of consequence harmonious. For these reasons we have taken the liberty of differing from his Lordship of Gloucester with respect

(A) The Germans, Russians, and Scandinavians, who were never thoroughly civilized till the gospel was preached among them.

(B) The mystagogues were the ministers who acted the chief part in celebrating the mysteries. to the persons who first instituted the secret mysteries of the Pagan religion.

Another writer, of considerable reputation in the republic of letters, is of opinion, that the mysteries were entirely commemorative; that they were instituted with a view to preserve the remembrance of heroes and great men, who had been deified in consideration of their martial exploits, useful inventions, public virtues, and especially in consequence of the benefits by them conferred on their contemporaries.—According to him, the (c) mysteries of Mithras were established for this very purpose. It would be no difficult matter to prove that the Persian deity of that name was the sun, and that his name and insignia jointly ascertain the truth of this assertion. The same writer extends this observation to the mysteries of the Egyptians, Phoenicians, Greeks, Hetrucans; and in a word, to all the institutions of that species throughout the world. In opposition to this singular opinion, it may be argued, we think with some show of reason, that the method of preserving the memory of great and illustrious men generally adopted, was the establishing festivals, celebrating games, offering sacrifices, singing hymns, dances, &c. We can recollect no secret mysteries instituted for that purpose at least in their original intention. If any usage of the commemorative kind was admitted, it was superinduced at some period posterior to the primary institution. At the same time, upon the supposition that the orgia of Bacchus were the same with those of the Egyptian Osiris, and that the mysteries of Ceres exhibited at Eleusis were copied from those of the Egyptian Isis, and allowing that the former was the sun, and the latter the moon; it will be difficult to find out the human persons whose exploits, adventures, inventions, &c. were intended to be immortalized by those institutions. Upon the whole, the mysteries were performed in secret; they were intended to be communicated only to a few; of course, had they been instituted with a view to immortalize the memory of heroes and great men, the authors would have acted the most foolish and inconsistent part imaginable.—Instead of transmitting the fame of their heroes with eclat to posterity, they would by this procedure have consigned it to eternal oblivion.

We must then recur to our first position. The mysteries were the offspring of bigotry and priesthood; they originated in Egypt, the native land of idolatry. In that country the priesthood ruled predominant. The kings were engrafted into their body before they could ascend the throne. They were possessed of a third part* of all the land of Egypt. The sacerdotal function was confined to one tribe, and was transmitted unalienably from father to son. All the orientals, but more especially the Egyptians, delighted in mysterious and allegorical doctrines. Every maxim of morality, every tenet of theology, every dogma of philosophy, was wrapped up in a veil of allegory and mysticism. This propensity, no doubt, conspired with avarice and ambition to dispose them to a dark and mysterious system of religion. Besides, the Egyptians were a gloomy† race of men; they delight in darkness and solitude. Their sacred rites were generally celebrated with melancholy airs, weeping, and lamentation. This gloomy and unioial bias of mind must have stimulated them to a congenial mode of worship. In Egypt then we are to search for the origin of the mysteries. Both the nature of the institution and the genius of the people confirm this position; and historians, both ancient and modern, are agreed in admitting the certainty of the fact.

The Osiris of Egypt, everybody knows, was the original Bacchus; as the Isis of the same country was the Ceres of the Greeks. The rites of Osiris were performed with loud shrieks and lamentations when and Ceres he was put into the coffin; and with the most extravagant mirth, when he was in a manner raised from the dead, or supposed to be found again. Their hymns were upon the whole always composed in melancholy affecting strains; and consisted of lamentations for the loss of Osiris, the mystic flight of Bacchus, the wanderings of Isis, and the sufferings† of the gods. The Canaanites, who were a kindred tribe of the Mizraim et Qfr. or Egyptians, imitated them in their sacred rites. At Byblus, Berytus, Sidon, and afterwards at Tyre, they used particularly mournful dirges for the death of Adonis or Tammuz §, who was the same with the Egyptian Dionysius, i.e. the sun.

The Egyptians, then, naturally inclined to gloom of death and secrecy, instituted a mode of worship congenial with their natural disposition of mind. The recesses of Isis' fun towards the southern hemisphere, was the death* of Osiris; the wanderings of Isis in search of her husband and brother, allegorically imported the longing of the earth† for the return of the fructifying‡ influences of the solar heat.

When that luminary returned towards the summer solstice, and grain, trees, fruits, herbs, and flowers adorned the face of nature, another festival was celebrated of a very different complexion from that of the former. In this season all Egypt was dissolved in the most extravagant mirth and jollity. During the celebration of those festivals, the priests performed allegorical representations of the sun and the earth (p). They personified the one and the other, and allegorized their motions, aspects, relations, sympathies, accesses, recesses, &c. into real adventures, peregrinations, sufferings, contests, battles, victories, defeats, and so forth. These, in process of time, were held up to the vulgar as real occurrences; and these in a few ages became the most essential articles of the popular creed. From this source were derived the conquests of Dionysus or Bacchus, so beautifully exhibited by Nonnus in his Dionysiaca;

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(c) Principio hoc ego quidem controveria vacare, arbitror, mysteria quae vocantur, ritus suisse idcirco institutos ne memoria veterum beneficiorum, inventorum, fatorum rerum gellarum quibus primi populorum conditores, aut aliis praclaris homines, decus nomen, et famam, inter suos sibi comparaverant. Neque haec cuicumque, sententia mirabilis videri poterit. Cod. Syr. Intellect. ed. Moabimii, p. 329.

(d) Isis, among the Egyptians, sometimes signified the moon, and sometimes the earth. Dionysiacs; the wanderings of Io, wonderfully adorned by Æchylus; and the labours of Hercules, afterwards usurped by the Greeks.

Whether the Egyptians deified mortal men in the earliest ages has been much controverted. Jablonski has taken much pains to prove the negative. Diodorus affirms us, that they paid their monarchs a kind of divine adoration, even in their lifetime. Plutarch tells us plainly, that some were of opinion that Isis, Osiris, Horus, Anubis, Typhon, were once mortal persons, who were exalted into demons after their death. The Sicilian, in his history of Isis and Osiris, Pan, Hermes, &c., plainly represents them as human personages; and informs us, that the Egyptians imagined, that after their decease they transmigrated into particular stars. From these authorities, we are inclined to believe that the Egyptians, as well as the other Pagans, did actually deify persons who had distinguished themselves in their days of nature by prowess, wisdom, useful arts, and inventions. This was a constant practice among the Greeks, who probably learned it from the people in question.

The exploits of these heroes had been disguised by allegorical traditions and hieroglyphical representations. They had been magnified beyond all dimensions, in order to astonish and intimidate the vulgar. They had been interlarded with the most extravagant fables, in order to gratify their propensity towards the marvelous. All these secrets were developed in the mysteries. The catechumens (E) were informed of every particular relating to the birth, the life, the exploits, the adventures, the misfortunes, and decease of those heroic personages, and when, and by what means, they had attained to the high rank of divinities. At the same time we think it highly probable, that those demi-gods were represented in their state of exaltation and heavenly splendour. The magicians of Egypt were abundantly qualified for exhibiting angels in machines. The souls of virtuous men, who had not been eminent enough to merit the honour of deification, were shown in all the perfection of Elysian felicity; and perhaps the souls of tyrants, and of the children of Typhon, were shown in Tartarus, suffering all the extremes of infernal punishment. From these exhibitions the mystagogues might naturally enough take occasion to read their pupils suitable lectures on the happy tendency of a virtuous conduct, and the dishonour and misery consequent upon a contrary course. They might set before them immortal renown, deification, and Elysium, on the one hand, and eternal infamy and misery on the other. This will probably be deemed the chief advantage accruing from this institution.

Besides the communications above mentioned, the catechumens were taught many secrets of physiology, or the nature of the phenomena of the world. This Pharmutus everywhere affirms, especially in his last book towards the end. Plutarch too informs us, that many of the Greek philosophers were of opinion, that most of the Egyptian fables were allegorical details of physical operations. Eusebius acquaints us, that the physiology, not only of the Greeks, but likewise of the barbarians, was nothing else but a kind of science of nature, a concealed and dark theology, involved in fable and fiction, whose hidden mysteries were veiled over with enigmas and allegories, that the ignorant million were as little capable of comprehending what was said as what was suppressed in silence. This, says he, is apparent from the poems of Orpheus and the fables of the Phrygians and Egyptians. Dionysius of Halicarnassus likewise observes, that the fables of the Greeks detail the operations of nature by allegories. Proclus makes the same observation concerning the people in question. The Egyptians, says he, taught the latent operations of nature by fables.

These physiological secrets were no doubt expounded to the initiated; and that the Egyptian priests were deeply skilled in physiological science, can scarce be questioned, if we believe that James and Jambres stories of valued Moses with their enchantments. The preceding Egyptian detail comprehends all that was revealed to the Egyptian in the original Egyptian mysteries. What articles might have been introduced afterwards we cannot pretend to determine.

Be that as it may, one thing is certain, namely, that the vulgar were excluded from all those choice secrets, which were carefully reserved for the nobility and sacerdotal tribes. To them it was given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of darkness; but to those who were without, all was mystery and parable. While the laity fed on husks, the clergy and the quality feasted on royal dainties. The priests who had devised these allegories understood their original import, and bequeathed it as an inestimable legacy to their children. Here then we have the primary object of the mysteries, namely, to convey to the initiated the original and rational import of those allegorical and mystical doctrines which were tendered to the uninitiated, wrapped up in impenetrable allegory and obscurity. To the former, these were communicated and explained: The latter were obliged to stand at an awful distance, and retire as the Procul, O procul eft profani, thundered in their ears.

These allegorical traditions originated in Egypt. (See Mythology.) It was the general bias of the oriental genius. The Egyptians, however, according to the most authentic accounts (G), were the greatest proficient in that science. The original subject of these institutions were, we imagine, the articles we have specified above: but in process of time, according to the natural course of things, numerous improvements were made, and many new rites, ceremonies, usages, and even doctrines, were superinduced, which were utterly unknown to the original hierophants (H). Simplicity is, for

(E) Catechumens were pupils who were learning the elements of any science. (F) Typhon was the evil genius, or devil, of the Egyptians. (G) As early as the age of Joseph, the Egyptians were skilled in the interpretations of dreams, divinations, &c., and in the age of Moses they were become wise men, magicians, &c. (H) Hierophant imports a priest employed in explaining the doctrines, rites, &c., communicated to the initiated. for the most part, one of the distinguishing characters of a new intuition; but succeeding architects generally imagine that something is still wanting to complete the beauty, the regularity, the uniformity, the magnificence, and perhaps the conveniency of the structure. Hence, at length, it comes to be so overloaded with adventitious drapery, that its primary elegance and symmetry are altogether defaced. This was the case with the earliest Egyptian mysteries. Their subject was at first simple and easy to be comprehended; in time it became complex, intricate, and unintelligible.

In order to celebrate these mysteries with the greater secrecy, their temples were so constructed as to favour the artifice of the priests. The fanes, in which they used to execute their sacred functions, and to perform the rites and ceremonies of their religion, were subterranean apartments, constructed with such wonderful skill and dexterity, that every thing that appeared in them breathed an air of solemn secrecy. Their walls were covered with hieroglyphic paintings and sculpture, and the altar was situated in the centre of the apartment. Modern travellers have of late years discovered some vestiges of them, and bear witness to the above description of those dark abodes (1). In those subterranean mansions, which the priests of that ingenious nation had planned with the most consummate skill, the kings, princes, and great men of the state, encountered the dangers and hardships contrived to prove their prudence, fortitude, patience, abstinence, &c. These were appointed to try their merit; and by these the hierophants were enabled to decide whether or not they were duly qualified for receiving that benefit. Upon these occasions, we may believe, abundance of those magical tricks were exhibited, for which the magicians of Egypt were so much celebrated among the ancients. The strange and astonishing sights, the alternate successions of light and darkness, the hideous spectres exposed to view, the frightful howlings echoed by these internal domes, the scenes of Tartarus and Elysium, exhibited alternately and in quick succession, must have made a deep and lasting impression on the mind of the affrighted votary (K). These scenes we shall describe more fully in the sequel.

From the scenes exhibited in celebrating the Egyptian mysteries, especially those of Isis and Osiris, the Greeks seem to have copied their ideas of the infernal regions, and the subterranean mansions of departed souls. Many colonies of Egyptians settled in Greece. From these the muses (L), or most early bards of Greece, learned them imperfectly. Of course, we find Homer's account of the infernal regions, and of the state of departed souls, lame and incoherent. Succeeding bards obtained more full and more distinct information. Euripides and Aristophanes seem to have paved the way for the prince of Roman poets, Plato, and some of the other philosophers have shown by their descriptions or allusions, that the whole apparatus of Tartarus and Elysium had become a hackneyed topic some centuries before Virgil was born. This incomparable poet borrowed his ideas from Homer, Ariosto, Euripides, Plato, &c. These, under his platonic hand, in the sixth Aeneid, grew into a system beautiful, regular, uniform, and confluent. The materials he has employed were created to his hand; he had only to collect, polish, arrange, and connect them.—The sentiments collected from the Platonic philosophy, and the inimitable episode copied from the annals of Rome, by the masterly skill which he has displayed in the application of them, form the chief excellencies of the piece. For the rest, he could well dispense with going to Eleusis (M); every old woman in Athens and Rome could repeat them.

Egypt was then the native land of mysteries as well as of idolatry. Every god and goddess respectively brought had their mysteries; but as those of Isis and Osiris were the most celebrated, they of course became principal objects of pursuit as well as of imitation to the neighbouring nations. These, as is generally believed, were carried into Persia by Zoroastres, or Zerdusht, by whom they were consecrated to Mithras. On these we shall make some observations in the sequel.—Orpheus imported them into Thrace; Cadmus brought them into Boeotia, where they were sacred to Bacchus. Inachus established them at Argos in honour of Juno, the same with Isis (N); Cyniras in Cyprus, where they were dedicated to Venus. In Phrygia they were sacred to Cybele, the mother of the gods.

Our learned readers, who will probably reflect that the Egyptians were in ancient times inhospitable to strangers, will perhaps be surprized that this factious and jealous people were so ready to communicate the arcana of their religion to foreigners.—But they will please recollect, that a great part of Greece was planted with colonies from Egypt, Phoenicia, Palestine, &c. This we could easily prove, did the bounds prescribed us admit such a digression. Orpheus, if not an Egyptian, was at least of oriental extraction. Inachus, Cadmus, and Melampus, are universally allowed to have been Egyptians. Erechtheus, in whose reign the Eleusinian mysteries were established, was an Egyptian by birth, or at least sprung from Egyptian ancestors. The Egyptians, then, in those early ages, did not view the Greeks in the light of aliens, but as a people nearly related either to themselves or the Phoenicians, who were their brethren. Upon this connexion we imagine it was, that in later times most of the sages of Greece,

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(1) See an excellent description of these subterraneous abodes, and of the process of probation carried on there, in a French romance, entitled The Life of Sethos.

(K) Persons who had descended into Trophonius's vault were said to have been so terrified with shocking sights, that they never laughed during the remainder of their lives.

(L) These were itinerant poets like our minstrels, who frequented the houses of the great men of Greece, and entertained the company upon public occasions with singing and tales of other times.

(M) Bishop Warburton has, with much ingenuity, and a vast profusion of reading, endeavoured to prove that Virgil borrowed the whole scenery of the sixth Aeneid from the sources mentioned in the text.

(N) Isis was the moon, and the original Juno was the same planet. Greece, especially of Athens, found so hospitable a reception among that people. They probably viewed them in the light of propagandists; apostles able and willing to disseminate their idolatrous rites. This observation, which might be supported by numberless authorities, did the nature of the present inquiry permit, will, we think, go a great way towards obviating the objection.

Although, as has been observed, every particular deity had his own peculiar mysterious sacred rites, yet of all others those of Mithras, Bacchus (o), and Ceres, were deemed the most august, and were most universally and most religiously celebrated. To these, therefore, we shall in a good measure confine ourselves upon this occasion. If our readers shall become intimately acquainted with these, they may readily dispense with the knowledge of the rest, which are, indeed, no more than streams and emanations from these sources. We shall then, in the first place, present to our readers a brief sketch of the mysteries of Mithras.

Mithras, or, according to the Persian, Mihr, was one of the great gods of the Avestics. His worship was for many ages confined to Persia. Afterwards, however, it was propagated far and wide, that some have imagined they had discovered vestiges of it even in Gaul. Mihr, according to Dr Hyde, signifies love, and likewise the sun. If we might presume to differ from so respectable an authority, we should conjecture that it is a cognate of the Hebrew word mithir, "excellence, praetantia." That there was an analogy between the Hebrew and old Persian, is generally admitted by the learned. Be that as it may, Mithras was the fun (p) among the Persians; and in honour of that luminary this institution was established. Mithras, according to Plutarch (q), was the middle god between Oramaz and Ariaman, the two supreme divinities of Persia. But the fact is, the solar planet was the visible emblem of Oramaz, the good genius of the Persian tribes, and the same with the Osiris of the Egyptians. From these people, some have imagined that Zoroastres (r), or Zerdusht, borrowed his mysteries of Mithras. To this opinion we cannot give our assent, because the probationary trials to be undergone by the candidates among the former were much more savage and sanguinary than among the latter. Both, however, were instituted in honour of the same deity; and probably the scenes exhibited, and the information communicated in both, were analogous; a circumstance which perhaps gave birth to the opinion above mentioned.

The grand festival of Mithras was celebrated six days, in the middle of the month Mehr (s). Upon these days, it was lawful for the kings of Persia to get drunk and dance. On this festival, we imagine, the candidates for initiation, having duly proved their vocation, were solemnly admitted to the participation of the mysteries.

Zoroastres (t) worshipped Mithras, or the Sun, in a certain natural cave, which he formed into a temple, and filled up in a manner exactly mathematical. There Mithras was represented as presiding over the lower world with all the pomp of royal magnificence. In it too were seen the symbols of Mithras and of the world, philosophically and mathematically exhibited, to be contemplated and worshipped. This deity was sometimes represented as mounted on a bull, which he is breaking, and which he kills with a sword. On some bas reliefs still existing, he appears as a young man with his tiara turned upward, after the manner of the Persian kings. He is clothed with a short tunic and breeches, after the Persian fashion. Sometimes he wears a small cloak. By his sides are seen other human figures, with tiaras of the same fashion on their heads, but without cloaks. One of these figures commonly holds in his one hand a torch lifted up; in the other, one turned downward. Sometimes over the cave are seen the chariots of the sun and moon, and divers constellations, such as cancer, scorpio, &c.

In one of these caves the ceremonies of initiation Probation were performed; but before the candidate could be any admitted, he was forced to undergo a course of probatory exercises, so numerous and so rigorous, that very few had courage and fortitude enough to go through them. He was obliged to live a life of virtue and abstinence for the space of seven years previous to the period of his initiation. Some months before it, he was obliged to submit to a long and austere fast, which continued fifty days. He was to retire several days to a deep and dark dungeon, where he was successively exposed to all the extremes of heat and cold. Meanwhile he frequently underwent the bastinado, which the priests applied without mercy. Some say this flogging continued two whole days, and was repeated no less than fifteen times. In the course of these probationary exercises, the candidate was generally reduced to a skeleton; and we are told, that there have been several instances of persons who have perished in the attempt.

Upon the eve of the initiation, the aspirant was obliged to brace on his armour, in order to encounter the enemy.

(o) Bacchus was the Osiris of the Egyptians, and Ceres was the Isis of the same people. (p) Mosheim, in his notes on Cudworth's Intellectual System, page 330, has taken much pains to prove that Mithras was a deified mortal; but we cannot agree with that learned man in this point. (q) Isis and Osiris, page 369. l. 20. from the bottom. This philosopher makes Zoroaster, according to some, 5000 years prior to the Trojan war. This date is certainly extravagant. We cannot, however, agree, with some moderns, who make him contemporary with Darius Hystaspes, the immediate successor of Cambyses, because it contradicts all antiquity. (r) M. Silohwette, Dider. v. page 17, asserts that Zoroaster was initiated among the Egyptians. (s) The month Mehr began September 30, and ended October 30. (t) See Dr Hyde de Rel. vet. Per. pages 16, 17. Mr Bryant's Anal. vol i. page 232. Porphyri. de Antro Nymph. page 254. This philosopher often mentions the cave of Mithras, and always attributes the institution of his rites to Zoroaster. Mysteries.

ter giants and savage monsters. In those spacious subterraneous mansions a mock hunting was exhibited. The priests and all the subordinate officers of the temple, transformed into lions, tygers, leopards, boars, wolves, and other savage creatures, afflained him with loud howlings, roaring, and yelling, and every instance of ferine fury. In those mock combats, the hero was often in danger of being really worried, and always came off with bruises and wounds. Lampridius informs us, that when the emperor Commodus was initiated, he actually carried the joke too far, and butchered one of the priests who attacked him in the figure of a wild beast. The Persians worshipped Mithras or the Sun by a perpetual fire; hence the votary was obliged to undergo a fiery trial; that is, to pass seven times through the sacred fire, and each time to plunge himself into cold water. Some have made these probationary penances amount to so; others have thought that they were in all only 8. As we find no good authority for either of these numbers, we think ourselves at liberty to hazard the following conjecture: The number seven was deemed sacred over all the east. The Mithraic penances we imagine were either seven, or if they exceeded it, were regulated by seven repetitions of that number. The candidate having undergone all these torturing trials with becoming patience and fortitude, was declared a proper subject for initiation. But before his admission he was obliged to bind himself by the most solemn oath, with horrible imprecations annexed, never to divulge any single article of all that should be communicated to him in the course of his initiation.

What ἀναγκαῖα or ineffable secrets were imparted to the initiated, it is impossible at this distance of time to discover with any tolerable degree of certainty. We may, however, rest assured, that the most authentic tradition concerning the origin of the universe; the nature, attributes, perfections, and operations, of Ormazd; the baleful influences of Ariman; and the benign effects of the government of Mithras, were unfolded and inculcated. The secret phenomena of nature, as far as they had been discovered by the Magi, were likewise exhibited; and the application of their effects, to astonish and delude the vulgar, were taught both in theory and practice. The exercise of public and private virtues was warmly recommended; and vice represented in the most odious and frightful colours. Both these injunctions were, we may suppose, enforced by a display of the pleasures of Elysium and the pains of Tartarus, as has been observed above in describing the mysteries of the Egyptians.

Those initiations are mentioned by Lampridius in the life of Commodus, and likewise by Justin † and Tertullian ‡, who both flourished in the second century.

† Dial. cum Tryphonie. ‡ De praescript. adver. Hierar.

The last of these two speaks of a kind of baptism, which washed from the souls of the initiated all the stains which they had contracted during the course of their lives prior to their initiation. He at the same time mentions a particular mark which was imprinted upon them (v), of an offering of bread, and an emblem of the resurrection; which particulars, however, he does not describe in detail. In that offering, which was accompanied with a certain form of prayer, a vessel of water was offered up with the bread. The same father elsewhere informs us, that there was presented to the initiated a crown suspended on the point of a sword; but that they were taught to say, Mithras is my crown. By this answer was intimated, that they looked upon the service of that deity as their chief honour and ornament.

After that the Teletee (x) were finished, the pupil was brought out of the cave or temple, and with great solemnity proclaimed a lion of Mithras (y); a title which imported strength and intrepid courage in the service of the deity. They were now consecrated to the god, and were supposed to be under his immediate protection; an idea which of course animated them to the most daring and dangerous enterprises.

The worship of Mithras was introduced into the Roman empire towards the end of the republic, where it made very rapid progress. When Christianity began to make a figure in the empire, the champions of paganism thought of proposing to men the worship of this power of benevolence, in order to counterbalance or annihilate that worship, which the Christians paid to Jesus Christ the true Sun of righteousness. But this mode was soon abolished, together with the other rites of paganism. The Persian grandees often affected names compounded with Mithras; hence Mithridates, Mithrobarzanes, &c. Hence, too, the precious stone called Mithridat †, which by the reflection of the sun † Selenus, sparkled with a variety of colours. There is likewise cap. 10, a certain pearl of many different colours, which they call Mithras. It is found among the mountains near the Red sea; and when exposed to the sun, it sparkles with a variety of dyes. We find likewise a king of Egypt of that name, who reigned at Heliopolis; who being commanded in a dream to erect an obelisk to the solar deity, reared a most prodigious one in the neighbourhood of that city.

The votaries of Mithras pretended that he was sprung from a rock, and that therefore the place where the sprung from a mysterious ceremonies were communicated to the initiated was always a cave. Many different reasons have been assigned for the origin of this rock-born deity, most of which appear to us unsatisfactory. If our readers will be obliging enough to accept of a simple and obvious conjecture, they may take the following:

(u) In allusion to this practice of imprinting a sacred mark, probably on the forehead of the initiated, we find the injunction to the angel, Ezek. chap. ix. ver. 4. and the Revelation palium.

(x) The mysteries were called Teletee, which imports, "the rites which confer perfection."

(y) Tertull. adv. Marc. p. 55. The priests of Mithras were called the lions of Mithras, and his priestesses lionesses; some say hyenas. The other inferior ministers were called eagles, hawks, ravens, &c., and on their festivals they wore masks corresponding to their titles, after the Egyptian manner, where the priests appeared at the ceremonies with masks resembling the heads of lions, apes, dogs, &c., a circumstance which furnishes a presumption that the mysteries of Mithras were of Egyptian original. A rock is the symbol of strength and stability (z); the dominion of Mithras, in the opinion of his votaries, was firm as a rock, and stable as the everlasting hills. If our readers should not admit the probability of this conjecture, we would beg leave to remit them to the learned Mr Bryant's Analysis of Mythology, where they will find this point discussed with deep research and wonderful ingenuity. Whatever may have been the origin of this opinion with relation to the birth of Mithras, it is certain that some reverence to rocks and caves was kept up a long time even after the establishment of Christianity. Hence the prohibition given to some of the profane to that religion, that they should no more presume to offer up their prayers ad petrae, at the rocks (A).

We shall conclude our account of the mysteries of Mithras, with a passage from M. Anquetil, to whom we are so much indebted for what knowledge we have of the Persian theology, and in which the functions of that deity are briefly and comprehensively delineated.

"The peculiar functions of Mithras are to fight continually against Ahriman and the impure army of evil genii, whose constant employment is to scatter terror and desolation over the universe; to protect the frame of nature from the demons and their productions. For this purpose he is furnished with a thousand ears and a thousand eyes, and traverses the space between heaven and earth; his hands armed with a club or mace. Mithras gives to the earth light and life; he traces a course for the waters; he gives to men corn, pastures, and children; to the world virtuous kings and warriors; maintains harmony upon earth, watches over the law," &c. As the history of Mithras, and the nature of his mysteries, are not generally known, we imagined it would be agreeable to many of our readers to have the most important articles relating to that subject laid before them as it were in detail.

We now proceed to the orgia or mysteries of Bacchus, which we shall introduce with a brief history of that deity. The original Dionysus or Bacchus was the Osiris of the Egyptians, which last was the Sun (n). Whether there was an Egyptian monarch of that name, as Diodorus Siculus affirms §, has no manner of connexion with the present disquisition. The Greek name of that deity is plainly oriental, being compounded of ἄις, "bright," and νάσα or νάσα, in the Æolic dialect νάσα, "a prince." This name was imported from the east by Orpheus, Cadmus, or by whoever else communicated the worship of Osiris to the Greeks. That the Dionysus of the Greeks was the same with the Osiris of the Egyptians, is universally allowed. Herodotus tells us expressly *, that Osiris is Dionysus in the Greek language: Martianus Capellus, quoted above, expresses the very same idea †. The original Osiris was then the sun; but the Dionysus or Bacchus of the Greeks was the same with the Osiris of the Egyptians; therefore the Bacchus or Dionysus of the Greeks was likewise the same luminary.

The name Osiris has much embarrassed critics and etymologists. The learned Jablonowski ‡, instead of delineating the character, attributes, operations, adventures, exploits, and peculiar department assigned this deity by his votaries, has spent much of his pains on trying to investigate the etymology of his name. If it be granted, which is highly probable, that the Hebrew and Egyptian tongues are cognate dialects, we should imagine that it is actually the Chophor or Offerer of the former language, which imports, "to make rich, to become rich." Indeed the words Osiris and Iser were not the vulgar names of the sun and moon among the Egyptians, but only epithets importing their qualities. The name of the sun among that people was Phri or Phry, and that of moon Ioh, whence the Greek Io. The term Osiris was applied both to the sun and to the river Nile; both which by their influence contributed respectively to enrich and fertilize the land of Egypt.

It was a general custom among the orientals to denominate their princes and great men from their gods, demigods, heroes, &c. When the former were advanced to divine honours, they were in process of time confounded with their archetypes. The original divinities were forgotten, and these uptart deities usurped their place and prerogatives. In the earliest periods of the Egyptian monarchy, there appeared two illustrious personages, Osiris and Isis. These were the children of Cronus; and being brother and sister, they were joined in matrimony, according to the custom of the Egyptians. As the brother and husband had assumed the name of the Sun, so the sister and consort took that of Isis, that is, "the woman §," a name which Horapollo, the Egyptians applied both to the moon and to the earth, in consequence of the similarity of their nature, their mutual sympathy, and congenial fecundity. Osiris having left his consort Isis regent of the kingdom, with Hermes as her prime minister, and Hercules as general of her armies, quitted Egypt with a numerous body of troops, attended by companies of fauns (c), satyrs, singing women, musicians, &c., and traversed all Asia to the eastern ocean. He then returned homeward through the Upper Asia, Thrace, Pontus, Asia Minor, Syria, and Palestine. Wherever he marched he conferred numberless benefits on the savage inhabitants. He taught the art of cultivating the ground, preferring the fruits of the earth, and distinguishing the wholesome and nutritive from the unwholesome and poisonous. He instructed them in the culture of the vine; and where vines could not be produced, he communicated to them the method of producing a fermented liquor from barley, very little inferior to wine itself. He built many cities in different parts.

(z) Our Saviour probably alludes to this emblem, when he talks of building his church on a rock; and adds, that the gates of hell should not prevail against it.

(A) The Caledonian druids seem to have regarded certain stones with a superstitious veneration, in which the Catholics imitated them. There are in several places of Scotland large stones, which the vulgar call lecre stones, i.e. we imagine, lecture.

(B) See Macrob. lib. i. cap. 21. p. 247. bottom. Diogenes Laert. in prooemio, par. 10. Martian. Capel. lib. ii. Jablonowski, vol. i. lib. ii. 415. par. 3. Plut. Isis et Osir. paflim.

(c) Men and women dressed in the habits of those rural deities. parts of the globe, planted numerous colonies (D), and wherever he directed his course instituted just and wholesome laws, and established the rites and ceremonies of religion, and left priests and catechists of his train to teach and inculcate the observance of them. In short, he left everywhere lasting monuments of his progress, and at the same time of his generosity and benevolence. Where he found the people docile and submissive, he treated them with kindness and humanity; if any showed themselves obstinate, he compelled them to submit to his institutions by force of arms.

At the end of three years, he returned to Egypt, where his brother Typhon, a wicked unnatural monster, had been forming a conspiracy against his life. This traitorous design he soon after accomplished in the following manner: He invited Osiris, with some other persons whom he had gained over, to an entertainment. When the repast was finished, he produced a beautiful coffin, highly finished, and adorned with studs of gold; promising to bestow it on the person whom it should fit best. Osiris was tempted to make the experiment. The conspirators nailed down the cover upon him, and threw the coffin into the river. This coffin, which was now become the coffin of Osiris, was, they tell us, wafted by the winds and waves to the neighbourhood of Byblus, a city of Phoenicia, where it was cast on shore, and left by the waves at the foot of a tamarind tree.

Isis in the mean time, disconsolate and forlorn, attended by Anubis, was rambling every quarter in search of her beloved Osiris. At length being informed by her faithful attendant and guardian, that his body was lodged somewhere in the neighbourhood of Byblus, she repaired to that city. There, they say, she was introduced to the queen, and after (E) a variety of adventures she recovered the corpse of her husband, which, of course, she carried back with her to Egypt; but the mischievous Typhon, ever on the watch, found her on the banks of the Nile; and having robbed her of her charge, cut the body into 14 parts, and scattered them up and down. Now, once more, according to the fable, Isis set out in quest of those parts, all of which, only one excepted, she found, and interred in the place where she found them; and hence the many tombs of Osiris in that country. These tombs were denominated tapetins by the natives. Many other fabulous adventures were ascribed to those two personages, which it is not our province to enumerate at present. If our readers should wish to be more minutely informed on this subject, they may have recourse to the authors mentioned in the last quoted author, or to the learned Mr Bryant's Analysis of Ancient Mythology, and M. Cour de Gebelin, where they will find matter enough to gratify their curiosity.

To commemorate those adventures, the mysteries of Isis and Osiris were instituted; and from them both rites of Isis and Osiris were derived. Of the Egyptian solemnity, we have an exact epitome in one of the fathers of the church to the following purpose: "Here follows (says he) an epitome of the mysteries of Isis and Osiris. They deplore annually, with deep lamentations and shaved heads, the catastrophe of Osiris over a buried statue of that monarch. They beat their breasts, mangle their arms, tear open the scars of their former wounds; that by annual lamentations the catastrophe of his miserable and fatal death may be revived in their minds. When they have practised these things a certain number of days, then they pretend that they have found the remains of his mangled body; and having found them, their sorrows are lulled asleep, and they break out into immoderate joy." What maxims of morality, secrets of physiology, or phenomena of astronomy, were couched under this allegorical process, is not our business to investigate in this place. We shall only observe, that, in all probability, Osiris and Isis were sovereigns of Egypt at a very early period; that they had conferred many signal benefits on their subjects, who, influenced by a sense of gratitude, paid them divine honours after their decease; that in process of time they were confounded with the sun and the moon; and that their adventures were at length magnified beyond all credibility, interlarded with fables and allegories, and employed in the mysteries as channels to convey a variety of instructions to the initiated.

Be that as it may, it is certain that the very name of worship, was established by Byblus, and in after ages transferred to Tyre. The Mizraim and Chaldeans and Phoenicians were nearly connected by blood, and their religious ceremonies were derived from the very same source. By what medium the worship of Osiris at Abydos and Tyre was connected, we shall leave others to explain; we shall only observe, that among the Phoenicians this deity obtained the names Adonis and Bacchus. The former is rather an (F) epithet than a name: the latter is evidently an allusion to the weeping and lamentation (G) with which the rites were performed. We find another name of that divinity mentioned in Scripture (H); but that term is plainly of Egyptian original: we shall now proceed to the mysteries of Osiris as they were celebrated among the Greeks and Thracians, under the name of the Oritia of Dionysus or Bacchus.

Orpheus, the celebrated Thracian philosopher, had travelled into Egypt in quest of knowledge; and from de Idol.

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(D) Many have thought this expedition fabulous; but the numberless monuments of Egyptian architecture, sculpture, and statuary, lately discovered in the east, confirm it.

(E) For the conquests and adventures of Osiris and Isis, we must send our learned readers to Diod. Sic. Bibl. i. i. and Plut. Isis et Osiris, p. 256. et seq., which we have been obliged to abridge, in consequence of the narrow limits prescribed us.

(F) Adonis is evidently the Hebrew Adoni, "my lord," and imports the sovereignty of the deity.

(G) Bacchus is derived from the Phoenician word bahah, "to weep." This was the name embraced by the Romans.

(H) Ezek. chap. viii. ver. 14. Tammuz is the name of one of the months of the Egyptian year. that country, according to the most authentic accounts, he imported the Bacchanalian rites and institutions. Some have affirmed that this same Orpheus being intimately acquainted with the family of Cadmus, communicated these rites to them, and endeavoured to transfer them to the grandson of that hero, which grandson became afterwards the Grecian Bacchus. It is, however, we think much more probable, that those rites were imported from Egypt or Phoenicia, by (1) Cadmus himself, who was a native of the former country, and is thought to have spent some time in the latter, before he emigrated in quest of a settlement in Boeotia. It is said that Semele, the daughter of Cadmus, and the mother of the Grecian Bacchus, was struck with lightning at the very instant of his birth. The child was, in all probability, denominated Bacchus (κ), from the sorrow and lamentation this melancholy accident had occasioned in the family. Cadmus, in order to conceal the dishonour of his daughter, might, we imagine, convey away his infant grandson to some of his relations in Phoenicia or Egypt. There he was educated and instructed in all the mysteries of Isis and Osiris, and at the same time initiated in all the magical or juggling tricks of the Egyptian priests and hierophants. Thus accomplished, when he arrived at manhood, he returned to Thebes with the traditional retinue of the original deity of the same name; and claimed divine honours accordingly. This claim, however, was not admitted without much opposition; Pentheus, another grandson of Cadmus, was torn to pieces by the frantic Bacchanalians upon Mount Citheron, because he attempted to interrupt them in celebrating the orgia. Some have thought that Cadmus lost his kingdom for the same reason; but this we think is by no means probable: we should rather imagine that the old prince was privy to the whole proceedings, and that it was originally planned by him, with a view to attract the veneration of his new subjects, by making them believe that there was a divinity in his family.

Be that as it may, the vain-glorious Greeks attributed all the actions of the Egyptian hero to their new Bacchus; and according to their laudable practice, engaged him in numberless adventures in which his prototype had no share. Most of those are futile and unentertaining (L). The Greeks commonly adopted some oriental personage as the hero of their mythological rhapsodies. Him they naturalized and adopted into some Grecian family, and so he became their own. To him they ascribed all the adventures and exploits of the oriental archetype from whom he was copied. Consequently in the orgia (M), every thing was collected that had been imported from the east relating to Osiris; and to that farrago was joined all that the Grecian rhapsodists had thought fit to invent, in order to amuse the credulous multitude. This, however, was not the whole of the misfortune: The adventures of Osiris were described by the Egyptian hierophants, veiled with allegorical and hieroglyphical mysteries. These the persons who imported them into Greece did not thoroughly comprehend, or if they did, they were not inclined to communicate them found and unsophisticated. Besides, many oriental terms were retained, the import of which was in process of time lost or distorted. Hence the religious ceremonies of the Greeks became a medley of inconsistencies. The mysteries of Bacchus, in particular, were deeply tinged with this meretricious colouring; the adventures of the Theban pretender were grafted upon those of the Egyptian archetype, and out of this combination was formed a tissue of adventures disgraceful to human nature, absurd, and inconsistent. Indeed the younger or Theban Bacchus seems to have been a monster of debauchery; whereas the Egyptian is represented as a person of an opposite character. Of course the mysteries of the former were attended with the most shocking abominations.

These mysteries, as has been observed above, were first celebrated at Thebes the capital of Boeotia, underof Bacchus the auspices of the family of Cadmus. From this spread into country they gradually found their way into Greece, Greece, &c., and all the neighbouring parts of Europe. They were celebrated once every three years (N), because at the end of three years Osiris returned from his Indian expedition. As the Greeks had impudently transferred the actions of the Egyptian hero to their upstart divinity, the same period of time was observed for the celebration of those rites in Greece that had been ordained for the same purpose in Egypt.

When the day appointed for the celebration of the orgia (O) approached, the priests issued a proclamation, enjoining all the initiated to equip themselves according to the ritual, and attend the procession on

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(1) Cadmus and Melampus, who were both Egyptians, introduced the Bacchanalia into Greece. The Egyptian or oriental name of Bacchus was Dinytis, that is, "the prince of light." Cadmus had learned the name Bacchus from the Phoenicians.

(κ) We have omitted the immense farrago of fable relating to the connexion between Jupiter and Semele as of little importance to our readers.

(L) Nonnus, an Egyptian of Pentapolis, has collected all the fabulous adventures of Bacchus, and exhibited them in a beautiful but irregular poem: To this we must refer our learned readers. Of the Dionysiacs we have a most judicious sketch, Gebelin, Calend. p. 553, et seq.

(M) The orgia belonged to all the Mydones, but to those of Bacchus in a peculiar manner.

(N) Hence these orgia were called Triteria.

(O) According to Clem. Alexand. Cohort. page 12. Pott. the word orgia is derived from orge, which signifies "anger," and originated from the resentment of Ceres against Jupiter, in consequence of a most outrageous insult he had offered her with success. We should rather imagine it derived from the Hebrew word argoz, signifying a "chest or coffin," alluding to the casket which contained the sacred symbols of the god.—The Egyptians or Phoenicians might write and pronounce, argoz, argoz, or in some manner nearly resembling orgia.