BY
HIPPOLYTO JOSEPH DA COSTA, ESQ.
LONDON
SOLD BY MESSRS. SHERWOOD, NEELY, AND JONES,
PATERNOSTER-ROW.
1820
THE mysteries of the ancients, and the associations in which their doctrines were taught, have hardly been considered in modern times, but with a view to decry and ridicule them.
The systems of ancient mythology have been treated as monstrous absurdities, debasing the human reason, conducting to idolatry, and favouring depravity of manners.
However, they deserve attention, if the motives of their inventors, rather than the profligacy and ignorance of their corruptors be contemplated.
When men were deprived of the light of revelation, those who formed systems of morality to guide their fellow creatures, according to the dictates of improved reason, deserved the thanks of mankind, however deficient those systems might be, or time may have altered them; respect, not derision, ought to attend the efforts of those good men; though their labours might have proved unavailing.
In this point of view must be considered an association, traced to the most remote antiquity, and preserved through numberless viscissitudes, yet retaining the original marks of its foundation, scope, and tenets.
It appears, that, at a very early period, some contemplative men were desirous of deducting from the observation of nature, moral rules for the conduct of mankind. Astronomy was the science selected for this purpose; architecture was afterwards called in aid of this system; and its followers formed a society or sect, which will be the object of this enquiry.
The continuity of this system will be found sometimes broken, a natural effect of conflicting theories, of the alteration of manners, and of change of circumstances, but it will make its appearances at different periods, and the same truth will be seen constantly.
The importance of calculating with precision the seasons of the year, to regulate agricultural pursuits, navigation, and other necessary avocations in life, must have made the science of astronomy an object of great care, in the government of all civilized nations; and the prediction of eclipses, and other phenomena, must have obtained for the learned in this science, such respect and veneration from the ignorant multitude, as to render it extremely useful to legislators, in framing laws for regulating the moral conduct of their people.
The laws of nature and the moral rules deducted from them were explained in allegorical histories, which we call fables, and those allegorical histories were impressed in the memory by symbolical ceremonies denominated mysteries, and which, though afterwards misunderstood and misapplied, contain
systems of the most profound, the most sublime, and the most useful theory of philosophy.
Amongst those mysteries are peculiary remarkable the Eleusinian. Dionysius, Bacchus, Orisis, Adonis, Thamuz, Apollo, &c., were names adopted in various languages, and in several countries, to designate the Divinity, who was the object of those ceremonies, and it is generally admitted that the sun was meant by these several denominations.
Let us begin with a fact, not disputed, that in these ceremonies, a death and resurrection was represented, and that the interval between death and resurrection was sometimes three days, sometimes fifteen days.
Now, by the concurrent testimony of all ancient authors the deities called Osiris, Adonis, Bacchus, &c. were names given to, or types, representing the sun, considered in different situations, and contemplated under various points of view.
Therefore, these symbolic representations, which described the sun as dead, that is to say, hidden for three days under the horizon, must have originated in a climate, where the sun, when in the lower hemisphere, is, at a certain season of the
year, concealed for three days from the view of the inhabitants.
Such climate is, in fact, to be found as far north as latitude 66°, and it is reasonable to conclude, that, from a people living near the polar circle, the worship of the sun, with such ceremonies, must have originated; and some have supposed that this people were the Atlantides.
The worship of the sun is generally traced to Mitraic rites, and those invented by the Magi of Persia. But if the sun could be made an object of veneration, if the preservation of fire could be thought deserving of religious ceremonies, it is more natural that it should be with a people living in a frozen clime, to whom the sun is the greatest comfort, whose absence under the horizon for three days is a deplorable event, and whose appearance above the horizon a real source of joy.
Not so in Persia, where the sun is never hidden for three days together under the horizon, and where its piercing rays are so far from being a source of pleasure, that to be screened from them, to enjoy cool shades, is one of those comforts, to obtain which all the ingenuity of art is exerted. The worship, therefore, of the sun, and the keeping sacred fires, must have been a foreign introduction into Persia.
The conjecture is strengthened by some important facts, which, referring to astronomical, allusions, place the scene out of Persia, though the theory is found there.
In the Boun Dehesch (translated by Anquetil Du Perron page 00) we find, that "the longest day of the summer is equal to the two shortest of the winter; and that the longest
night in the winter is equal to the two shortest nights in summer."
This circumstance can only take place at the latitude of 9° 0', where the longest day of the year is of sixteen hours ten minutes, and the shortest of eight hours five minutes.
This latitude is far beyond the limits of Persia, where history places Zoroaster, to whom the sacred doctrines; of the Persian book Boun Dehesch are attributed. This proportion, then, of days and nights, as a general rule could only be true in Scythia, whether at the sources of the Irtisch, the Oby, the Jenisci, or the Slinger.
We know nothing of the antient history of those Scythians or Massagetes, but we know that they disputed their antiquity with the Egyptians, and that the above principle, though attributed to the Persian Zoroaster, is only applicable to the country of those Scythians.
But let the origin of the mysteries of the sun begin where it may, they were celebrated in Greece, in various places, amongst others, at Appollonia, a city dedicated to Apollo, and situated in latitude °. In this latitude the longest day has fifteen hours, differing three hours from the length of the day when the sun is on the equinoxial: the reverse is the case with the nights.
This circumstance will account for the preservation of three days in these mysteries, even when celebrated in Greece, and
also for the fifteen days, or representation of the number of fifteen in some of the Eleusinian rites.
The mysterious numbers were employed to designate such and similar operations of nature, for it is said that the Pythagorean symbols and secrets were borrowed from the Orphic or Eleusinian rites; and that they consisted in the study of the sciences and useful arts, united with theology and ethics, and were communicated in cyphers and symbols. Similar intimations, as to the mystic import of numbers are found in many other authors.
The letters, representing numbers formed cabalistic names, expressive of the essential qualities of those things they meant to represent; and even the Greeks, when they translated foreign names, whose cabalistic import they knew, so they rendered them by Greek letters, as to preserve the same interpretation in numbers, which we find exemplified in the name Nile.
But in the number three to which so many mystical and moral allusions were made, had a reference to the three celestial circles, two of which the sun touches, passing over the third in its annual course.
The mysteries of Eleusis, the same as those of Dionysius or Bacchus, were supposed by some to have been introduced into Greece by Orpheus: they may have come there from Egypt, but Egypt may have received them at a previous period from the Persians, and these again from the Scythians; but taking them only as we find them in Greece, we will give here an outline of their ceremonies.
The aspirant for these mysteries was not admitted a candidate till he had arrived at a certain age, and particular persons were appointed to examine and prepare him for the rites of
initiation. Those, whose conduct was found irregular, or who had been guilty of attrocious crimes, were rejected, those found worthy of admittance were then instructed by significant symbols in the principles of society.
At the ceremony of admission into these mysteries, the candidate was first shown into a dark room, called the mystical chapel. There certain questions were put to him. When introduced, the holy book was brought forward, from between two pillars or stones: he was rewarded by the vision:5">5 a multitude of extraordinary lights were presented to him, some of which are worthy of particular remark.
He stood on a sheep skin; the person opposite was called the revealer of sacred things6 and he was also clothed in a sheep skin or with a veil of purple, and on his right shoulder a mule skin spotted or variegated, representing the rays of the sun and stars.7 At a certain distance stood the
torch-bearer, who represented the sun; and beside the altar was a third person, who represented the moon.
Thus we preceive, that over those assemblies presided three persons, in different employments, and we may remark, that in the government of the caravans in the eastern countries, three persons also direct them, though there are five principal officers, besides the three mathematicians; those three persons are, the commander in chief, who rules all; the captain of the march, who has the ruling power, as long as the caravan moves; and the captain of the rest, or refreshment, who assumes the government, as soon as the caravan stops to refresh.
Some authors have observed the same division of power, in the march of the Israelites through the wilderness, and consider Moses as the captain general, Joshua the captain of the march; and perhaps Aaron as the captain of the rest.
The society of which we are speaking, was ruled by three persons, with different duties assigned to them, by a custom of the most remote antiquity.
The mysteries, however, were not communicated at once, but by gradations, in three different parts. The business of the initiation, properly speaking was divided into five sections, as we find in a passage of Theo, who compares philosophy to those mystic rites.
These ceremonies, thus far, appear to contain the lesser mysteries, or the first and second stages of the candidate in his
progress through the course of his initiations. There was, however, a third stage, when the candidate, himself, was made symbolically to approach death, and then return to life.
In this third stage of the ceremony, the candidate was stretched upon the couch,5"> to represent his death.
As to the festivities, in which those mysteries were celebrated, we find that on the 7th of the month Athyr the images of Osiris were enclosed in a coffin or ark: on the 8th was the search; and on the 9th was the finding.5
Thug in fables or symbolical histories, relating to these mysteries, we find Adonis slain and resuscitated; the Syrian women weeping for Thamuz, &c.
Let us now examine what was meant by this symbolical
death and resurrection, or by certain personages, said to have visited the Hades, and returning up again.
It appears that this type in all its various forms and denominations,
indicated the sun passing to the lower hemisphere, and coming again to the upper.
The Egyptians, who observed this worship of the sun, under the name of Osiris, represented the sun in the figure of an old man, just before the winter solstice, and typified him by Serapis, having the constellation of Leo opposite to him, the Serpent or Hydra under him, the Wolf on the east of the Lion, and the Dog on the west. This is the state of the southern hemisphere at midnight about that period of the year.
The same Egyptians represented the sun by the boy Harpocrates, at the vernal equinox; and then was the festivity of the death, burial, and resurrection of Osiris; that is to say, the sun in the lower hemisphere; just coming up, and rising above in the upper hemisphere.
In this upper situation the sun was called Horus, Mithras, &c. and hailed as sol invictus. We will now point out some other symbols to express the same phenomena, though different from those types we are treating of at present.
In the Mithraical astronomical monuments, where the figure of a man is represented conquering and killing a bull, there are two figures by their sides with torches; one pointing downwards, the other, upwards.
These monuments, where the mysteries in question were depicted, the man killing and conquering the bull, represent the sun, passing to the upper hemisphere, through the sign of Taurus, which in that remote period (four thousand six hundred years before our era) was the equinoxal sign. The two
torch-bearers, the one pointing his torch downwards, the other upwards, represent the sun passing down to the lower hemisphere, and coming up again.
At the remote time before alluded to, the sun entered the sign Taurus, at the summer equinox, and the year was begun at this period among the Egyptian astronomers. Afterwards, in consequence of the precession of the equinoxes, the summer equinox took place in the sign of Aries; hence part of the Egyptians transferred their worship from the bull or calf to the ram; while others continued to worship the bull.
We may explain this in the language of our modern astronomers by saying, that some of the learned Egyptians continued to reckon by the moveable zodiac, while others reckoned the year by the fixed zodiac; and this circumstance produced a division of sects in the people, as it was a division of opinion, amongst the learned.
Likewise, by the same precession of the equinoxes, the sun
passed from Aries to Pisces in the vernal equinox, about three hundred and thirty eight years before our era; yet the beginning of the year continued to be reckoned from Aries. If the Egyptian astronomy and Egyptian religion had then existed with the same vigour, both would have perhaps suffered a similar alteration; but the Egyptian systems were at that period nearly annihilated. We may observe, however, that the Christians, at the beginning of our era, marked their tombs; with fishes, as an emblem of Christianity, to distinguish their sepulchers from those of the heathens, by a symbol unknown to them.
Returning from this short digression to our immediate purpose, we have to observe, that if those ceremonies and symbols were meant to represent the sun, and the laws of its motions, these very phenomena of nature were studied with a moral view, as being themselves types or arguments to a more sublime or metaphysical philosophy; and the moral rules therefrom deducted, were impressed on the memory by those lively images and representations.
The emerging of the sun into the lower hemisphere, and its returning, was contemplated either as a proof or as a symbol of the immortality of the soul; one of the most important, as well as the most sublime tenets of the Platonic Philosophy.5">
The doctrines of the spirituality and immortality of the soul, explained by those symbols, were very little understood, even by the initiated; thus we find some of them took those types to signify merely the present body, by their descriptions of the infernal abodes; whereas, the true meaning of these mysteries inculcated the doctrine of a future state of the soul, and future rewards and punishments; and that such were the doctrines of those philosophers is shown by many and indisputable authorities.
The union of the soul with the body was considered as the death of the soul; its; separation as the resurrection of the soul; and such ceremonies and types were intended to impress the doctrine of the immersion of the soul into matter as is well attested.
By the emblem of the sun descending into the lower hemisphere was also represented the soul of the man, who through ignorance and uncultivation, was in a state compared to sleep, or almost dead; which mystery was intended to stimulate man to the learning of sciences.
The Egyptians also considered matter as a species of mud or mire, in which the soul was immerged; and in an ancient author we find a recapitulation of these theories in the same sense.
The Persians, who followed the tenets of Zerdoust, called by the Greeks Zoroaster, having received the same doctrines upon the mystical contemplation of the sun, made also the same metaphysical application to the soul, of the passage of the sun through the signs; of the zodiac.
The sun, moreover, was considered as the symbol of the active principle; whereas the moon and earth were symbols of the passive.
The sun itself, considering its beneficial influence in the physical world, was chosen as; the symbol of the Deity, though afterwards taken by the vulgar as a Deity.5">
It must be here particularly observed, that the different names, which the Egyptians (from whom the Greeks learnt them) gave to God, instead of meaning several gods were only expressions of the different productive effects of the only one God. Not very different from
what the Jews derive from the great name Tetragramaton.
The fables, allegories, and types of the ancients, being of three classes, import some times various meanings; therefore, some of the ceremonies to which sublime import is attached, are also applied to typify less dignified operations, in the natural system. Thus, for instance, the fable of Proserpine, which alludes to the immersion of the soul into the body, was also employed to symbolize the operation of the seed in the ground.
But the general doctrine of Plato of the descent of the soul into the darkness; of the body, the perils of the passions, the torments of vices, appears to be perfectly described by Virgil; though this Poet was of the Epicurean sect, the most fashionable in his days.
The lesser mysteries represented, as we have seen, the descent of the soul into the body, and the pains therein suffered. The greater mysteries were intended to typify the splendid visions, or the happy state of the soul, both here and hereafter, when purified from the defilements of material nature. These doctrines are also inculcated, by the fables of the fortunate islands, the Elysian fields, &c. The different purifications in these rites were symbols of the gradation of virtues, necessary to the re-ascent of the soul. Inward purity, of which external
purifications were symbols, can only be obtained by the exercise of these virtues.5">
To the allusion of these virtues must be understood what Socrates says,5"> that it is the business of the philosophers to study to die and to be themselves death; and as at the same time he reprobates suicide, such death cannot mean any other but philosophical death, or the exercise of what he calls the cathartic virtues.
If such was the meaning and import of the Eleusinian and Dionysian rites, symbols, and ceremonies, it must be allowed that a society or sect, which was employed in the contemplation of such sublime truths, cannot be looked upon as trifling or profligate.
The very Christian Fathers, who so strongly attacked the Pagan religion, confessed the utility of these symbols;5"> and that the circumstances previous to initiation into those mysteries,
tended to exclude impious notions, and prepare the mind to hear the truth.5">
Those mysteries were concealed from the vulgar; because it would be a ridiculous prostitution of such sublime theories to disclose them to the multitude incapable of understanding them, when even many of the initiates, for want of study and application, did not comprehend the whole meaning of the symbols.
The multitude were told only in the abstract, the doctrine of a future state of rewards and punishments, and were made acquainted with the calendar, the result of astronomical observations; the knowledge of which was connected with their festivities and agricultural pursuits. They were likewise taught other practical parts of science calculated for general use.
The secrecy of these mysteries was the first cause of obloquy against them; next came, beyond doubt, the depravity of their followers, and the perversion of those assemblies into convivial meetings first, and then into the most debauched associations.
Secrecy, also, was enjoined by the laws, it was death to reveal any thing belonging to the Eleusinian mysteries; to disclose imprudently any thing about them, was supposed even indecorous; of this we find a very conspicuous; instance in Plutarch.
Out of respect for this custom the scholars were, in general, only instructed in the exoteric doctrines. The acroamatic doctrines were taught only to the few select, by private communication and viva voce.
Rut when the ignorance of the very teachers of those mysteries caused their forms only to be attended to, the essence was lost, the shadow only remained; and, then, even those forms and ceremonies were frequented by persons, ignorant of their import, and wicked enough to turn them to their private interests, as a machine employed in deceiving the people, and to occasions of debauchery and depravity. We shall give an example of this,
The mysteries of Eleusis, or the Sun, were united or analogous to those of Dionysius or Bacchus; because, according to the Orphic theology, the intellect of every planet was denominated Bacchus: so when the sun was considered as the spiritual intelligence, who moved or caused this planet to move, in its annual circle, he was denominated Trietericus Bacchus.
The ceremonies, therefore, of Bacchus, were attended with rejoicings, as the triumph of the spirit over matter; but this circumstance, so intimately connected with the sublime notions of the Eleusinian mysteries, was completely turned into a mere banqueting, and processions of drunken people, who of the ceremonies knew nothing else, than to carry branches of trees in their hands.
More, still: a depraved priest introduced those Bacchanalian mysteries into Rome, for the very worst of purposes, which alarming the Senate, the most severe punishment was inflicted on him and his followers.
In consequence of those abuses, it was, that Socrates refused to be initiated, and the same did Diogenes, alledging that Patæcion, a notorious robber, had obtained initiation: Epaminondas, also, and Agesilaus never desired it.5
But if those who were desirous of being licentious clothed themselves with those mysteries, this has nothing to do with the original tenets of the institution. For the purity of its votaries was carried, according to the primitive mysteries, to the most delicate and scrupulous point.6
After such respectable authorities, as we have referred to, we must reject, as impudent calumnies, the assertion of Tertullian, who says, that the natural parts of a man were enclosed in the ark carried about in the processions of those mysteries: Theodoret and Arnobius say, they were the parts of a woman: such assertors had no means of ascertaining what was not known to any one, out of the precincts of those most recondite mysteries.
We should rather guess, that in the ark, carried in the procession, and said to enclose the body of Osiris, spheres were deposited, representing our solar system.
In regard to these accusations, found in some of the ecclesiastical writers, we must also observe, that many of them, led by a mistaken zeal for the Christian religion, disfigured in a most reprehensible degree, the ancient historical monuments: taking, for instance, the manner in which the history of Egypt as written by Manethon, was transmitted to us by those ecclesiastical writers: others; of such writers, in fact, knew nothing of the Egyptian mysteries.
The conclusion, therefore, is, that the motives of those institutions were good and pure, as tending to the study of science, and practice of morality, though the same institutions
afterwards degenerated; and their degeneration was followed by the ruin of the state, as predicted by Trimegistus himself,
who in this prediction proved how great a philosopher and politician he was.
Having thus established what was the meaning and import of the Eleusinian or Dionysian mysteries amongst the ancient Greeks, who transmitted to us the knowledge of them; and having shown that the ceremonies were not intended in their origin as a worship of the sun, considered as a Deity, we shall proceed to examine how those mysteries were communicated to other nations by the Greeks.
About fifty years before the building of the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem, a colony of Grecians, chiefly Ionians, complaining of the narrow limits of their country, in an increased population, emigrated; and having been settled in Asia Minor, gave to that country the name of Ionia.
No doubt that people carried with them their manners, sciences, and religion; and the mysteries of Eleusis among the rest. Accordingly we find that one of their cities, Byblos, was famed for the worship of Apollo, as Apollonia had been with their ancestors.
These Ionians, participating in the improved state of civilization in which their mother country, Greece, then was, cultivated the sciences, and useful arts; but made themselves most conspicuous in architecture, and invented or improved the order called by their own name Ionian.
These Ionians formed a society, whose purpose was to employ themselves in erecting buildings. The general assembly of the society, was first held at Theos; but afterwards, in consequence of some civil commotions, passed to Lebedos.
This sect or society was now called the Dionysian Artificers, as Bacchus was supposed to be the inventor of building theatres; and they performed the Dionysian festivities. They afterwards extended themselves to Syria, Persia, and India.5
From this period, the Science of Astronomy which had given rise to the symbols of the Dionysian rites, became connected with types taken from the art of building.
These Ionian societies divided themselves into different sections, or minor assemblies. Some of those small or dependent associations; had also their distinguishing names.
But they extended their moral views, in conjunction with the art of building, to many useful purposes, and to the practice of acts of benevolence.
We find recorded, that these societies, and their utility, were many years afterwards inquired into, by Cambyses, king of Persia, who approved of them, and gave to them great marks of favour.
It is essential to observe, that these societies; had significant words to distinguish their members; and for the same purpose they used emblems taken from the art of building.
Let us now notice the passage of the Dionysian Artificers to Judea. Solomon obtained from Hiram, king of Tyre, men skilful in the art of building, when the Temple was erected at Jerusalem. Amongst the foreigners, who came on this occasion, we find men from Gabel, called Giblim;5 that is to say, the Ionians settled in Asia Minor, for Gabbel, or Byblos, was
that city where stood the temple of Apollo, where the Eleusinian rites or Dionysian mysteries were celebrated, as we have already stated.
We could, in addition to this argument produce some authority; for Josephus says that the Grecian style of architecture was used at the temple of Jerusalem.
After this we cannot be surprised to find that the ceremonies of Eleusis, or Thamuz, should be introduced into Judea, particularly, as Solomon himself, after having entered into the scientific allusions, in the construction of the temple, was not free from the accusation of the gross superstition of idolatry.
So we find some years afterwards the prophet Ezekiel complaining that the Israelitish women were weeping for Thamuz
at a certain period of the year, at the very gates of the temple.
But it is natural to suppose that the Dionysian Artificers would not have attempted to introduce those rites amongst the religious Jews, as a mere matter of idolatry, for the worship of the sun. The ideas of the Israelites, concerning the unity of God, would have revolted at any thing, inducing a belief of the polytheism of the Gentiles.
The symbol, therefore, in these mysteries, must have been explained to the Jews, to mean only the sun, in the true and original sense of those mysteries; that is to say, as an emblem of God's goodness to man; and the apparent motions of that luminary, first as the guide for fixing the seasons; next as types or remembrances of the immortality of the soul: for this dogma does not appear either clear in the books of the Jews before that period, or universally admitted amongst them at a much later date.
To avoid, therefore, any allusion to idolatry in these ceremonies and symbols, another personage or another name must have been substituted for Adonis or Osiris; and as a symbolical death and resurrection was essential, in the allegory of the
system, the history of the death of another individual must have been substituted . . . . . .
However, in framing this new symbolical history, such circumstances were to be related, connected with the death of that personage, as to typify and account for the whole of the Eleusinian mysteries, or the passage of the sun from the upper to the lower hemisphere, and its return up again.
In the formation of this new system, or rather new allegory to the same system, though the name of the hero was changed, the circumstances must have been preserved, as far as consistent with new names . . . . . . . .
The whole fabric of the temple would favor an allusion of this sort.
The foundation stone was laid on the second day of the second month; which corresponds upon an average to the 0th of April; reckoning the sacred year, upon the fixed zodiac.
Now if you rectify your globe to the latitude of Jerusalem (.° 0') at that period of the year, you will have the sun in Aries, or the sun represented by a ram or sheep, or a man in a sheep's skin; as the hierophant was represented, in the mysteries of Eleusis.
Therefore, the very period of the year in which the foundation stone of the temple was laid, would afford an opportunity of establishing upon it a new allegorical system, to explain the ancient mystery.
If we suppose the globe to represent the world in the position above described, the aspirant being in the west facing the hierophant, who in the east represents; the rising sun, the candidate will find himself between the two tropics, represented by the two columns which were placed on the west entrance of that temple . . . . . .
The better to understand the facility with which the ancient system could be adapted to the circumstances of the temple of Jerusalem, we must consider its typic emblems, according to the notions of the Jews, and some of the Christian fathers.
The temples built in honor of the several gods, were so shaped, as to have allusion to the supposed attributes of such gods. But the universe was supposed by the Platonists to be the true temple of the true and only God. The temple, therefore, dedicated to the true God, was to be a type of the universe.
Thus we find that the temple of Jerusalem was situated
east and west, and with dimensions and types all adapted to represent the universal system of nature.
If the temple of Solomon was a type of the universe, to
symbolize that Jehovah was no local God, but the only God, Lord of the universe; tradition also tells us that the place of assembly of the Dionysian Artificers was allegorically described
by its dimensions, as a symbol of the universe, in length, in breadth, in height, and in depth.
The ancients represented the course of the stars, by the winding of a snake; but if this snake was so placed as to have the tail in her mouth, it then represented eternity.
Now if we consider the beginning of the civil year amongst the Hebrews, the month Tisri, which was in the winter equinox; the sun, proceeding from thence, approaches the south, and touches the tropic of Capricorn; then retrocedes towards the north, crossing the equinoxal, and touching the tropic of Cancer; from whence retroceding again to the south, arrives at the equinoxial, finishing the year.
These points, in an extended map of the two hemispheres seem separate; but the emblem of the snake biting its tail, would represent the end of the year, meeting the beginning.
Mr. Hutchinson has proved, that the globes, on the top of the two columns, at the portico of the temple, were orreries, or
mechanical representations of the motions of the heavenly bodies.
I think, that after those circumstances, which afforded so many facilities for the introduction of the system of the Dionysian Artificers in Judea, the continuance of the same, in subsequent periods, cannot be of difficult explanation.
We find it stated, in the Book of the Maccabees, that a society existed in those days in Judea, called the Assideans or Cassideans, whose business it was to take care of the repairs of the temple.
From these Cassideans proceeded the sect or society of the Essenians, which, according to Philo and Josephus, were the same as the Assideans; and probably, because they admitted no women in their assemblies, Pliny says that they were propagated without wives.
Josephus mentions the first of the Essenians, in the time
of Aristobulus, and Antigonus the son of Hircanus; but Suidas and others were of opinion that they were a branch of the Rechabites, who subsisted before the captivity.
Josephus, probably ignorant of the secret tenets of the Essenians, also accuses them of worshipping the sun, or saying prayers before the sun rising, as if to incite him to rise. But this very accusation, again, identifies them with the sect of the Dionysian Artificers, who, as appears by the reasons above stated, were supposed to adore the sun.
Josephus relates many other particulars, by which, in a striking manner, he brings them to what we have related of the other societies which preceded them. It also points out the conformity of their ideas with those of the Platonists and Dionysians, on the nature of the soul. In short, they used
symbols, allegories, and parables, after the manner of the ancients.
The practices of those Essenians are represented by Philo as the most pacific, and full of social virtues; and those amongst them who were most enthusiastic for their tenets, had their goods in common, as the Christians had in the first ages of Christianity.
The Essenians had not their ceremonies and mysteries, recorded in history; but thus far we know, that they transmitted to posterity the doctrines which they received from their ancestors; they had also distinguishing signs; and the festival banquets; though it does not appear that they followed the profession of builders or architects exclusively.
Out of Judea we find also societies distinguished by the same characters as the Essenians, and with the same tenets of Plato; for, the Pythagoreans also employed the symbols from the art of building.
The Dionysian Artificers existed also in Syria, Persia, and India; and the Eleusinian mysteries were preserved in Europe, even at Rome, until the eighth century of the Christian era.5">
After this epoch, Europe was visited by the most barbarous nations who, persecuting every scientific research, scattered a general darkness, in which all the labours of the ancients, in favor of mankind, were nearly lost, in the general ignorance of their times.
Those very societies and sects, had also been in former periods much abused, and the ceremonies converted, as we have seen, for the worst of purposes: this was another powerful cause for their decline and ruin.
Christianity was then in Europe, the only bond of morality, by which power could, in some measure, be controuled, or restrained.
When the sciences began to revive, a general fanaticism prevailed, and a spirit of persecution appeared, which caused the ancient doctrines of philosophers, and the old systems of
morality to be regarded only as offsprings of atheism, and practices of idolatry.
Under these circumstances, the Eleusinians, the Dionysian Artificers, Assideans or Essenians, sunk into such oblivion, that no mention is made of them in history.
In the tenth century, during the wars of the crusades, some societies were instituted in Palestine, and Europe, which adopted some regulations resembling those of the ancient fraternities. But is was in England, and chiefly in Scotland, where the remains of the old system, identified with that of the Dionysian Artificers, were discovered in modern times.
Cætera desunt.