Nugae literariae: prose and verse

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Roman labarum, had this dogma ever lain dormant in Paganism. The preciolis doctrine Would have been dug into light, tooverthrow their Christian adversaries. But a Maximus had notthe hardihood to assert it, nor Iamblichus the ingenuitu to intimate it, nor Iulian the credulity to receivs it. Ηρ took othervieWs, indulged other dreanis, and only sought the restorationos the whole of his gods. It was an error of some of the sirst Christian writers to amrm sucti an opinion. Clemens Alexandrinus, Augustine, and Eusebius, Were of this number. Their motive appears to be, that they might the better attach thocharacter of the Pagan philosophers, as concealing their knowlodgo and hiding their light. But the Worship and reveretice of the gods Was a principat admonition in the conduci of thoso rites. And yet Warburton asseris that the Alystae Were taught, tho whole delusion os polytheismV l He adds, With his nice consistency,-that this Was με done under the most tremendousseat of secresy,' sor they Were informed, that the fori them- gelves punished the revealers of the secret ' l Was there eversuch baresaced sulcido in logic Θ This self-violence is not imposed on him by bringing distant sentences together. Can itho belloved that these are consecutive sentences 8-ADd most Unsatisfactory Was every sentiment concerning the immortalityos man. They could not 8Densthen the popular impression ofiliis, sor they only reflected the creed current among ali, but they impatred it. The acute and intelligent Would rather dissido in that which asked such auxiliaries. The very ternis of the poet ars far hom the manner of assurance. Non omnis moriar, ' is biit an autho 's vanity. Pulvis et umbra,' promise biit an eques fragility to both. Cicero's phlegm is

characteristic: Et si non ero, sensu omnino carebo.'' Plato ssentiment of the foui s reabsorption seemed to destroy iis idon- tity and self-recollection. - The cypreSS, hecause When that tres is cui down it never recoVers, Was the Stiade, - and theasphodel the flower, of their grave. Their Urn could notquichen iis aines. Their epicedium Was Seldom more than a

saltering of destre, generalty a Wail of deSpair. And even On the concession that the initiated were admittod

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to purer information, On What does their claim to benevolenco depend 8 Became they possessed of a higher and more holyknowledge 8 They Were sacramental ly pDdsed neVer to mulie

lamps in the recesses of the sanctuary, untii an opportunityshould arise When they might venture to place them alost toguide and save 8 The ansWer is, that eighteen ages saW this SyStem in eXistence, and no attempt Was made to turn it to thebonesit of hal La-hundred generations. ΝV, more, the SyStemitself hecame increasingly more corrupi. Juvenal did not spare the ministers and the stirines. Josephus describes Such incon- colu te abuse even of the Isiae rites, then observed at Rome,

that Tiborius commanded the crucifixion of her priesis, the demolition of her templo, and the contumelious stinging of her statue into the Tiber. Suetonius relates the fame faci, only he adds, that the exiles were permitted to retum on the condition and pledge that they Would no more celebrate their evit art. Tho Isiac ministers in the later centuries Very generalty practised tho Goetic and Theurgic aris of Egypt; and called themselves Μathematicians. When the Work of Constantine Was for a time apparently undone by his Successor, astrology and divinationWere avowed by them. We must recollect that Rome alWaysclaimed a purer mythology than Greece. Dionysius Halicarnassensis, speahing in his Roman Antiquities, remarks of Romulus, IIo established temples, and couris, and altars, and shrines, and images, and badges, and ranks, and ali themeans by whicli the gods ble8S Our nature: and the festivo

days whicli it is proper that we keep to ea ch one of the godsand genii, and the sacrifices in Whicli they delight to be Wortashipped by us, and the Dasis, and the celebrations, and theremissions of toti, and ali such things, following the most

approved solemnities os Greece: but he rejected ali tho traditions respecting them, in Whicli the charges of crime are castupon them, deeming them too gross, not only for gods, buttoo base for Wretched men. He taught his citigens to spes hand thin k in the most exalted maniter of them, and to ascribe

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to them nothing ianworthy of their blessed nature. Coeliis is never heard of among the Romans as mangled by his progeny, - nor Saturn eating up his oWn children test they shouldoverpoWer him, or Iupiter, having dethroned Saturn, shutting him in Tartarus,-nor the combais, the Wound8, the chains, nor the meniat ossices, of the gods among men,-nor iS any holyday overcast by sorroW, by female moans and paroxySmSfor gods carried OR as in the rape of Proserpine, and themissortunes of Bacchus, and stories of that hind. Nor can any one See among them, hoWever their habits may be depraved, men pretending inspiration, nor drunken hidden mysteries Though I am not ignorant of the uses of the Grecian fabies, Ιprefer the Roman theology : thinhing that the ad vant es offuch tables are sinati, and that only a very feW can be prosted by them. ' And this Was partly true, and the colonigation ofilio Isiac Worship in Rome Was felt to be a scandalous injury to public morais. The satirist spolie of Osiris as corrupted by presenis and bribes. The votaries of that superstition tookHarm, and apologised for it. All became allegory in theirhand. Thoy explained ali into historic faci or philosophic truth. Thero is not an inconsistency biit Iamblichus cm justify. Forinstance,-the objector Says that he cannot understand hoW tho violent threats of certain devotees can be reconciled, Such aS,- to bursi open heaven, to divulge the secrets of Isis, to streWtho limbs of Osiris to Typhon. 'l' The sophist reptios that

celestiat poWer,-but that there is a sori os poWers distributed throughout the Worid, unreflecting and irrationes, Whicli yieldio the inducement presented by another, but know nothing by themsolves, nor can distinguisti truth hom falsehood, nor possi-blo froni impossibio. This kind is moved by these truculent m naces, hecause they are agitated by Such emphatic expressions,

Illius lachrymae mentitaque numera PraeStant Ut veniam culpae non abnuat, anSere magno Scilicet et tenui popano corruptus Osiris. Juv : lib. vi.

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ON THE ISIAC MYSTERIES.

and carry Hl things with them under the influence of this astonished agitation. The history of these strange orgies noW draWs to iis close. They Were enCOUraged, RS We haVe seen, by Julian. His chios oration is to the Μother of the gods. On his coins, in the fourth centu , We mark the dei ed buli, the obverso having his head,-and in the reverse of another is the Anubis With the caduceus and sistrum. They Were finalty abolished by Theodosius. Without justifying his inter rencs With their roli-gious impori, most Warranted Was he in suppressing it as aleague os impostors and a nursery for crimes. Foolisti enoughwas the institute, When Plutarch rashly and impudently said, that there Was nothing in it uiareason te, idie, and supersti

ali tho darker studies and incantations of sorcery. The woridgromed beneath the curse of such absurdity, licentiousness, and Sacrilege. The proconsul os Greece might intercede Willi Valentinian for the delay of his sentence to eXtinguist the system,

it. In the mean time, who of the epoptae became, Dom iis lustration and impulse, the benefactor of his species Θ Whowas the desiverer, the philanthropist, that came forti, thetice, his country's blessing, the worti s restorer and Diend 8 Untiltho reign of Hadrian, there had been issued no proclamationagainst human sacrifices. And what was that whicli bullitis Very morais on obscenity, and taught iis virtuos Withinprecincis devoted to ali that can sichen and rovolt 8 What must the state os Deling be, When the loWest vice is piety,

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solid a pillar, and patriotism cannot imbibe So pure a motiVe. Sho livos in light, Sho wallis in iove, Knowledge is her herald, and Benevolence filis her train l

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Ilanc sententiam significare videtur Laconis illa vox, qui, cum Rhodius Diagoras, Olympionices nobilis, uno die duos suos filios victores Olympiae vidisset, accessit ad senem, et gratulatus, Ilorere, Diagora,' inquit, non enim in coelum adscensurus es.' Magna haec et nimium fortasse Graeci putant, vel tum potius putabant, isque, qui hoc Diagorae dixit, permagnum existimans, tres Olympionicas una e domo prodire, cunctari illum diutius in vita, fortunae objectum, inutile putabat ipsi. CICERO Tusc : Quaes : lib. 1., Sec. 46. - Τhe garianos wither On Four brOW, Then boast no more Four mighty deeds; Upon Death s purple altar no , See, Where the victor-victim bieeds :Your heads muSt come To the cold tomb,

Only the actions of the just

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ON THE OLYMPIC GAMES.

A thcns had lost in her first campaigii of the Peloponnesianwar, and whom She honoured to be in urned With hoarsed pompand cypress bier in the Public Sepulchre Whicli, covered withmilitary device and patriotic herHdry, gloomed in her fairest

suburb,-Pericles thus spoke, I deem it suffcient for men whohave tested their courage in action, by action to be honoured for it. By this oulogy he appears not only to denote the propriety of Such elegiac honours as Were then rendered, the procession, the torches, the trailing Spears, the drooping stand-ards, the solemn bringing home of the flain, the sumptuous though empty car Whicli represented them Who could not beseund among thoso that had fallen on the batile-seld or Wave, the piercing laments of the female Lindred, to Whom the ne est place Was conceded that they might look Within that mausoleum and mark iis piles of the illustrious dead, the sentiment con-Veyed a meaning that had acquired an early hold, and maintained a long possession, of the ancient Worid. It may thus be stated. It is most natural to mourn forthose torii Dom us by the grave. It is not custom, but theunbiassed heari, Whicli impolf this grief. But hoW strange is it that amidst scenes so melancholy, and corresponding InoodS SOPenSiVe, rude boisterous riot should prevail l The sto, thetear, are only decent: the matted hiar, the rent garment, thelacerated flesti, might be excused. There is something significant in ali these tributes to the departed i It is, hoWever, impossibio thus to interpret and justi0 keen contests of muscular quickness and strength around the pyre and the tomb. Yet these Were not of One age or country. True it is, that we

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ON THE OLYMPIC GAMES.

are osten reminded of them by the classic poets. But Homerwould novor have described the jousis whicli Achillos claimodsor the memory and repose of Patrocius,-nor Virgil the gymnastic rites Which AEneas os red to the stiade os Anchises at Drepanum on the anniversary of his funerat, had they dono violetice to the sentiments or Usages of the peoples for Whomthey Wrote. Their uri and taste Would have precluded such a license. Low down as the sera of Alexander the Great, we findthe eXistence of the custom. The dying conqueror alluding toit, and foreboding the quarreis that flowed froin the strife to bellis successor, Sald, I anticipato a bloody competition at myfunerat games. ' He emulated the more cruei part of these observances by sacrificing innumerable victitiis to the Manes

of Hephaestion, as tho Phthian chises had immolated the Trojans on the pile of his friend. The magnificence of his oWnobSequies required a preparation of tWo years; and We learn froni tho gries of his mother Olympias that he should so long

of tho solii depended Dpon the fact of early and besttingsepulture. The phrase employed concerning Polydorus,- animumque Sepulcro condimus, ' -We compose his solii in thegrave, - carries the idea to the extreme importunce of theseossices. It is related of Socrates ' that, When President of thepeople, he refused his sanction to the sentence Whicli condemned the nine captains to death for neglecting to pay the funerat rites to the dead, after the naval enga gement at the Arginusianislands, only because it Was impossibie froin the storin. Notmerely Was the troubled spirit of the uninterred supposed towander a hundred years on the banks of Styx, ut it Wasimagined that Vengeance Was dear and due to the Warrior stili. There re, after the most sanguinary enga gemenis, not a dissi-

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-- Absint inani funere naeniae, Luctusque turpes, et querimoniae :CompeSce clamorem, ac Sepulchri Mitte supervacuos honores. '

And then, too, osten a saVage immolation took place of the captives to the spectral host Whicli, it Was belleved, stili h vered round the scene. In the ax of Sophocles, the Atridae refuso his body buriat, tantii Teucrus and Ulysses overrule their relentiess hale. We revolt at the sacrifice of the four youth fulcaptives to the ghost of Pallas, the soli of Evander, ' or

common, Would never have been introduced at all, and least ofali ascribsed to his hero. Indeed, the sarther We descend , themore appalling is the spectacle. The Roman gladiators seem tohavo their origin in this cruei institution. They were at sirstentirely compelled to their mutuat butchery. Their name, bustiarii, marks that their frightful occupation was related to thoburning pile of the dead. This tribute Was not only presentedat the more solemn funerias, the Indictiva, -but when Wretches at last took up the mercenary business of this Staiaghter, evenprivate persons exhibited them for the honour of their doceasod frien d s. It became a universat opinion that the disembodiod

spirit Was grati sed by a libation of blood. Horaco, in his third

Satire of the second book, says, that is the heirs of Staberius h ad not ongraved the sum lio test them on his tomb, they Were condemned to engage a hundred patrs of gladiators for the plea- Sure of the people,-an association Which, it is equalty clear, is of a mortuary character. In the Lex Tullia, made by Cicorowhen Consul, it is ordat ned that no one Ahould exhibit shows of gladiators for two years before he stood candidato sor ossice,

uniess it was devolvod upon him by the Testament of a friend a further proos how prolonged Was the original design of theseshows. The same orator, in his nilath Philippic, pica ling for

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tho funereat honours of his deceased friend Servius Sulpicius, who had diod in discliarging an embaSSy to Antony,-moVes the Conscript Fathers to carry the reSolution, to please to decree, Statuam pedestrem seneam in RoStris Statui, circumque eam statuam locum ludis gladiatoribusque, liberos posterosque ejus quoquoVersus pedes quinque habere.' And this inhumanityis the more flagrant, because, though many of the gladiatorsWere as vile as their calling, yet there Were those Who groaned bonoath iis bondage. It was common to confine them previous to their combats, which says litile to prove their read iness fortho task. About four-score Who, With Other Six hundred, were inui up to grace the triumph of Probus, overpowered thoirguards, silod the capital With Harm, cui their oWn passagethrotio the crowds that thronged iis streeis, preferring to bomowed down by the soldiery to being the gazingstocli and sportos the amphitheatre. Similar escapes Were attempted at Praeneste, and Dom the army of Otho, in the dreadfui conflictos the two legions at the Po. Ηow natural are the care and daring of Antigone for the exposed remaliis os Eteocles t Howdetest te, mercii ess as absurd, are the deliberate executions os conquered hings and princesses, scornfully directed by the unre- lenting Victor, to complete his triumph through the Forum, and to solemnise his sacrifico in tho Capitol l In these enormities We discern the abuse of a custom whichwas intended to have an analogic meaning. The age of heroessoon became that of demigods. The games around their tumulishadowed their might and dint. They Were strictly, in tho srstinStanceS, commemorative. Ηence the remark of Pericles atready quoted. But When the dead received their apotheosis, worsh, Was added to commemoration. There WaS a tutelary to propitiate, and a poWer to adore. It pa8Sed frona the characteros a typic and laudatory festival to a more reverent alid religious ceremony. It stili swelled to a higher import. Forthe celebration of the demigod Was felt to be derogatorysrom the horiours required by the supernat deities. To themthese institutes Were soon primarily dedicated, While their