The FUMIGATION from every kind of SEED, except BEANS and AROMATICS. O Goddess, Earth, of Gods and men the source, Endu'd with fertile, all destroying force; All-parent, bounding, whose prolific pow'rs, Produce a store of beauteous fruits and flow'rs, All-various maid, th' eternal world's strong base Immortal, blessed, crown'd with ev'ry grace; From whose wide womb, as from an endless root, Fruits, many-form'd, mature and grateful shoot. Deep bosom'd, blessed, pleas'd with grassy plains, Sweet to the smell, and with prolific rains. All flow'ry dæmon, centre of the world, Around thy orb, the beauteous stars are hurl'd With rapid whirl, eternal and divine, Whose frames with matchless skill and wisdom shine. Come, blessed Goddess, listen to my pray'r, And make increase of fruits thy constant care; With fertile Seasons in thy train, draw near, And with propitious mind thy suppliant hear.

The FUMIGATION from MANNA. BLEST Pæan, come, propitious to my pray'r, Illustrious pow'r, whom Memphian tribes revere, Slayer of Tityus, and the God of health, Lycorian Phœbus, fruitful source of wealth . Spermatic, golden-lyr'd, the field from thee Receives it's constant, rich fertility. Titanic, Grunian, Smynthian, thee I sing, 7 Python-destroying, hallow'd, Delphian king: Rural, light-bearer, and the Muse's head, Noble and lovely, arm'd with arrows dread: Far-darting, Bacchian, two-fold, and divine, 11 Pow'r far diffused, and course oblique is thine. O, Delian king, whose light-producing eye Views all within, and all beneath the sky: Whose locks are gold, whose oracles are sure, Who, omens good reveal'st, and precepts pure: Hear me entreating for the human kind, Hear, and be present with benignant mind; For thou survey'st this boundless æther all, And ev'ry part of this terrestrial ball Abundant, blessed; and thy piercing sight, Extends beneath the gloomy, silent night; Beyond the darkness, starry-ey'd, profound, The stable roots, deep fix'd by thee are found. The world's wide bounds, all-flourishing are thine, Thyself all the source and end divine: 'Tis thine all Nature's music to inspire, With various-sounding, harmonising lyre; Now the last string thou tun'ft to sweet accord, 29 Divinely warbling now the highest chord; Th' immortal golden lyre, now touch'd by thee, Responsive yields a Dorian melody. All Nature's tribes to thee their diff'rence owe, And changing seasons from thy music flow Hence, mix'd by thee in equal parts, advance Summer and Winter in alternate dance; This claims the highest, that the lowest string, The Dorian measure tunes the lovely spring . Hence by mankind, Pan-royal, two-horn'd nam'd, 39 Emitting whistling winds thro' Syrinx fam'd; Since to thy care, the figur'd seal's consign'd, 41 Which stamps the world with forms of ev'ry kind. Hear me, blest pow'r, and in these rites rejoice, And save thy mystics with a suppliant voice.

(1) Now when they came forth from the holy place, they turned their faces towards the south when they began their prayers to God. For when the sun is setting, should anyone desire to pray to God, he ought to turn him thitherwards ; so also at the rising of the same, unto that spot which lies beneath the sun. As they were just beginning to recite the prayer, Asclepius did whisper:

[Asclepius] Let us suggest to father, Tat,—what he did bid us do, —that we should say our prayer to God with added incense and with unguents. Whom when Thrice-greatest heard, he grew distressed and said:

(30) We have declared acts of memory unnecessary to the stars, but we allow them perceptions, hearing as well as seeing; for we said that prayers to them were heard- our supplications to the sun, and those, even, of certain other men to the stars. It has moreover been the belief that in answer to prayer they accomplish many human wishes, and this so lightheartedly that they become not merely helpers towards good but even accomplices in evil. Since this matter lies in our way, it must be considered, for it carries with it grave difficulties that very much trouble those who cannot think of divine beings as, thus, authors or auxiliaries in unseemliness even including the connections of loose carnality.

In view of all this it is especially necessary to study the question with which we began, that of memory in the heavenly bodies.

It is obvious that, if they act on our prayers and if this action is not immediate, but with delay and after long periods of time, they remember the prayers men address to them. This is something that our former argument did not concede; though it appeared plausible that, for their better service of mankind, they might have been endowed with such a memory as we ascribed to Demeter and Hestia- or to the latter alone if only the earth is to be thought of as beneficent to man.

We have, then, to attempt to show: firstly, how acts implying memory in the heavenly bodies are to be reconciled with our system as distinguished from those others which allow them memory as a matter of course; secondly, what vindication of those gods of the heavenly spheres is possible in the matter of seemingly anomalous acts- a question which philosophy cannot ignore- then too, since the charge goes so far, we must ask whether credence is to be given to those who hold that the entire heavenly system can be put under spell by man's skill and audacity: our discussion will also deal with the spirit-beings and how they may be thought to minister to these ends- unless indeed the part played by the Celestials prove to be settled by the decision upon the first questions.

(3) After the deluge sent by the gods to destroy mankind at the close of the Iron Age, only Deucalion and Pyrrha were left alive. Entering a ruined sanctuary to pray, they were directed by an oracle to depart from the temple and with heads veiled and garments unbound cast behind them the bones of their mother. Construing the cryptic message of the god to mean that the earth was the Great Mother of all creatures, Deucalion picked up loose rocks and, bidding Pyrrha do likewise, cast them behind him. From these rocks there sprang forth a new and stalwart race of human beings, the rocks thrown by Deucalion becoming men and those thrown by Pyrrha becoming women. In this allegory is epitomized the mystery of human evolution; for spirit, by ensouling matter, becomes that indwelling power which gradually but sequentially raises the mineral to the status of the plant; the plant to the plane of the animal; the animal to the dignity of man; and man to the estate of the gods.

(190) Lest being baptized to the Furies of the Earth, and to the necessities of nature (as some one of the Gods saith), you should perish.

The FUMIGATION from MANNA. Hear me, Jove's daughter, celebrated queen, Bacchian and Titan, of a noble mien: In darts rejoicing and on all to shine, Torch-bearing Goddess, Dictynna divine; O'er births presiding, and thyself a maid, To labour-pangs imparting ready aid: Dissolver of the zone and wrinkl'd care, Fierce huntress, glorying in the Sylvan war: Swift in the course, in dreadful arrows skill'd, Wandering by night, rejoicing in the field: Of manly form, erect, of bounteous mind, Illustrious dæmon, nurse of human kind: Immortal, earthly, bane of monsters fell, 'Tis thine; blest maid, on woody hills to dwell: Foe of the stag, whom woods and dogs delight, In endless youth who flourish fair and bright. O, universal queen, august, divine, A various form, Cydonian pow'r, is thine: Dread guardian Goddess, with benignant mind Auspicious, come to mystic rites inclin'd Give earth a store of beauteous fruits to bear, Send gentle Peace, and Health with lovely hair, And to the mountains drive Disease and Care.

(1) That which follows after this, we shall no longer discuss generally, but direct our attention particularly to the works resulting from the virtues of Pythagoras. And we shall begin in the first place from the Gods, as it is usual to do, and endeavour to exhibit his piety, and the admirable works which he performed. Let this, therefore, be one specimen of his piety, which also we have before mentioned, that he knew what his soul was, and whence it came into the body, and also its former lives, and that of these things he gave most evident indications. After this also, let the following be another specimen; that once passing over the river Nessus with many of his associates, he spoke to it, and the river in a distinct and clear voice, in the hearing of all his followers, answered, Hail Pythagoras!

Farther still, nearly all historians of his life confidently assert, that in one and the same day he was present at Metapontum in Italy, and Tauromenium in Sicily, and discoursed in common with his disciples in both places, though these cities are separated from each other by many stadia both by land and sea, and cannot be passed through in a great number of days. The report, also, is very much disseminated, that he showed his golden thigh to the Hyperborean Abaris, who said that he resembled the Apollo among the Hyperboreans, and of whom Abaris was the priest; and that he did this in order that Abaris might apprehend this to be true, and that he was not deceived in his opinion.

Ten thousand other more divine and more admirable particulars likewise are uniformly and unanimously related of the man : such as infallible predictions of earthquakes , rapid expulsions of pestilence and violent winds, instantaneous cessations of the effusion of hail, and a tranquillization of the waves of rivers and seas, in order that his disciples might easily pass over them. Of which things also, Empedocles the Agrigentine, Epimenides the Cretan, and Abaris the Hyperborean, receiving the power of effecting, performed certain miracles of this kind in many places. Their deeds, however, are manifest. To which we may add, that Empedocles was surnamed an expeller of winds ; Epimenides, an expiator ; and Abaris, a walker on air ; because being carried on the dart which was given to him by the Hyperborean Apollo, he passed over rivers and seas and inaccessible places, like one walking on the air.

Certain persons likewise are of opinion, that Pythagoras did the same thing, when in the same day he discoursed with his disciples at Metapontum and Tauromenium. It is also said, that he predicted there would be an earthquake from the water of a well which he had tasted; and that a ship which was sailing with a prosperous wind, would be merged in the sea. And let these, indeed, be the indications of his piety.

(2) [Trismegistus] Nay, nay, Asclepius; speak more propitious words! For this is like to profanation of [our] sacred rites,—when thou dost pray to God, to offer incense and the rest. For naught is there of which He stands in need, in that He is all things, or all are in Him. But let us worship, pouring forth our thanks. For this is the best incense in God’s sight,—when thanks are given to Him by men.

(2) But “ the oblation of victims ,” when some evil is present in places about the earth, procures a remedy for the evil, and secures us from the incursion of any mutation or passion. Hence, whether a thing of this kind is effected through Gods or dæmons, it invokes these as the expellers of evil, and [our true] saviours, and through them exterminates all the injury which may accede from the calamities. Those powers, also, who avert genesiurgic and physical punishments, do not expel them through passions. And if some one should think that the suppression of the guardian care of the Gods, introduces a certain spontaneous injury, in this case the persuasion arising from pacification recalls the benevolence of the more excellent genera, to a providential attention to our affairs, and takes away our privation of good, being itself perfectly pure and immutable.

INITIATIONS ATTEND Musæus to my sacred song, And learn what rites to sacrifice belong. Jove I invoke, the earth, and solar light, The moon's pure splendor, and the stars of night; Thee Neptune, ruler of the sea profound, Dark-hair'd, whose waves begirt the solid ground; Ceres abundant, and of lovely mien, And Proserpine infernal Pluto's queen The huntress Dian, and bright Phœbus rays, Far-darting God, the theme of Delphic praise; And Bacchus, honour'd by the heav'nly choir, And raging Mars, and Vulcan god of fire; The mighty pow'r who rose from foam to light, And Pluto potent in the realms of night; With Hebe young, and Hercules the strong, And you to whom the cares of births belong: Justice and Piety august I call, And much-fam'd nymphs, and Pan the god of all. To Juno sacred, and to Mem'ry fair, And the chaste Muses I address my pray'r; The various year, the Graces, and the Hours, Fair-hair'd Latona, and Dione's pow'rs; Armed Curetes, household Gods I call, With those who spring from Jove the king of all: Th' Idæan Gods, the angel of the skies, And righteous Themis, with sagacious eyes; With ancient night, and day-light I implore, And Faith, and Justice dealing right adore; Saturn and Rhea, and great Thetis too, Hid in a veil of bright celestial blue: I call great Ocean, and the beauteous train Of nymphs, who dwell in chambers of the main; Atlas the strong, and ever in its prime, Vig'rous Eternity, and endless Time; The Stygian pool, and placid Gods beside, And various Genii, that o'er men preside; Illustrious Providence, the noble train Of dæmon forms, who fill th' ætherial plain; Or live in air, in water, earth, or fire, Or deep beneath the solid ground retire. Bacchus and Semele the friends of all, And white Leucothea of the sea I call; Palæmon bounteous, and Adrastria great, And sweet-tongu'd Victory, with success elate; Great Esculapius, skill'd to cure disease, And dread Minerva, whom fierce battles please; Thunders and winds in mighty columns pent, With dreadful roaring struggling hard for vent; Attis, the mother of the pow'rs on high, And fair Adonis, never doom'd to die, End and beginning he is all to all, These with propitious aid I gently call; And to my holy sacrifice invite, The pow'r who reigns in deepest hell and night; I call Einodian Hecate, lovely dame, Of earthly, wat'ry, and celestial frame, Sepulchral, in a saffron veil array'd, Pleas'd with dark ghosts that wander thro' the shade; Persian, unconquerable huntress hail! 59 The world's key-bearer never doom'd to fail On the rough rock to wander thee delights, Leader and nurse be present to our rites Propitious grant our just desires success, Accept our homage, and the incense bless.

(2) Again, however, assuming a more elevated exordium, I am desirous to exhibit the principles of the worship of the Gods, which Pythagoras and his followers established; viz. that all such particulars as they define with respect to doing or not doing a thing, have for the mark at which they aim, a consent with divinity. This also is with them the principle, [of piety] and their whole life is arranged with a view to follow God . The language, too, of their philosophy is this, that men act ridiculously in exploring good from any other source than the Gods; and that their conduct in this respect resembles that of a man, who in a country governed by a king should reverence one of the magistrates in the city, and neglect him who is the ruler of all of them.

For they were of opinion that such was the conduct of mankind. For since God is, and is the Lord of all things, it is universally acknowledged that good is to be requested of him. For all men impart good to those whom they love, and to those with whom they are delighted; but they give the contrary to good, to those to whom they are contrarily disposed. It is evident, therefore, that those things are to be done, in which God delights. It is, however, not easy for a man to know what these are, unless he obtains this knowledge from one who has heard God, or has heard God himself, or procures it through divine art. Hence also, the Pythagoreans were studious of divination.

For this alone is an interpretation of the benevolence of the Gods. And in short, he will conceive an employment of this kind to be worthy of regard, who believes that there are Gods; but he who thinks that either of these is folly, will also be of opinion that both are foolish. Many of the mandates, however, of the Pythagoreans were introduced from the mysteries; for they did not conceive them to be the productions of arrogance, but to originate from a certain divinity. And in a similar manner, all the Pythagoreans believe such things as are mythologically related of Aristeas the Proconesian, and Abaris the Hyperborean, and other particulars of a like nature. For they consider every thing of this kind to be credible; and of many [such] things they make trial themselves.

They also frequently recollect such-like particulars as appear to be fabulous, as not disbelieving in any thing which may be referred to divinity. A certain person therefore relates, that Eurytus said, that a shepherd feeding his sheep near the tomb of Philolaus, heard some one singing. But the person to whom this was related, did not at all disbelieve the narration, but asked what kind of harmony it was? Both of them, however, were Pythagoreans, and Eurytus was the disciple of Philolaus. It is likewise said, that a certain person told Pythagoras, that he appeared to himself once to converse with his father who was dead, and that he asked Pythagoras what this indicated? Pythagoras replied, that it indicated nothing; but that he had in reality conversed with his father.

As therefore, said he, nothing is signified by my now discoursing with you, so neither is any thing signified by your conversing with your father. Hence, in all particulars of this kind, they did not think that they were stupid, but those that disbelieved in them. For they did not conceive that some things are possible to the Gods, but others impossible, as those fancy who reason sophistically; but they believed that all things are possible to the Gods. And this very assertion is the beginning of the verses, which they ascribe to Linus, and which are as follow:

The FUMIGATION from STORAX. O Father Jove, who shak'st with fiery light The world deep-sounding from thy lofty height: From thee, proceeds th' ætherial lightning's blaze, Flashing around intolerable rays. Thy sacred thunders shake the blest abodes, The shining regions of th' immortal Gods: Thy pow'r divine, the flaming lightning shrouds, With dark investiture, in fluid clouds. 'Tis thine to brandish thunders strong and dire, To scatter storms, and dreadful darts of fire; With roaring flames involving all around, And bolts of thunder of tremendous sound. Thy rapid dart can raise the hair upright, And shake the heart of man with wild afright. Sudden, unconquer'd, holy, thund'ring God, 'With noise unbounded, flying all abroad; With all-devouring force, entire and strong, Horrid, untam'd, thou roll'st the flames along. Rapid, ætherial bolt, descending fire, The earth all-parent, trembles at thy ire; The sea all-shining; and each beast that hears The sound terrific, with dread horror fears: When Nature's face is bright with flashing fire, And in the heavens resound thy thunders dire. Thy thunders white, the azure garments tear, And burst the veil of all surrounding air. O Jove, all-blessed, may thy wrath severe, Hurl'd in the bosom of the deep appear, And on the tops of mountains be reveal'd, For thy strong arm is not from us conceal'd. Propitious to these sacred rites incline, And crown my wishes with a life divine: Add royal health, and gentle peace beside, With equal reason, for my constant guide. Next: XIX: To Jove, as the Author of Lightning Sacred Texts | Classics « Previous: The Initiations of Orpheus: XVII: To Pluto Index Next: The Initiations of Orpheus: XIX: To Jove, as the Author o... » Sacred Texts | Classics

(22) Critias: the occurrence of a shifting of the bodies in the heavens which move round the earth, and a destruction of the things on the earth by fierce fire, which recurs at long intervals. At such times all they that dwell on the mountains and in high and dry places suffer destruction more than those who dwell near to rivers or the sea; and in our case the Nile , our Saviour in other ways, saves us also at such times from this calamity by rising high. And when, on the other hand, the Gods purge the earth with a flood of waters, all the herdsmen and shepherds that are in the mountains are saved,

(45) The "talking" trees stood together, forming a sacred grove. When the priests desired answers to important questions, after careful and solemn purifications they retired to the grove. They then accosted the trees, beseeching a reply from the god who dwelt therein. When they had stated their questions, the trees spoke with the voices of human beings, revealing to the priests the desired information. Some assert that there was but one tree which spoke--an oak or a beech standing in the very heart of the ancient grove. Because Jupiter was believed to inhabit this tree he was sometimes called Phegonæus, or one who lives in a beech tree.

(11) Should he make an incantation, then are the gods [appeased

The FUMIGATION from AROMATICS. NYMPHS, who from Ocean's stream derive your birth, Who dwell in liquid caverns of the earth Nurses of Bacchus secret-coursing pow'r, Who fruits sustain, and nourish ev'ry flow'r: Earthly, rejoicing, who in meadows dwell, And caves and dens, whose depths extend to hell: Holy, oblique, who swiftly soar thro' air, Fountains and dews, and mazy streams your care: Seen and unseen, who joy with wand'rings wide And gentle course, thro' flow'ry vales to glide; With Pan exulting on the mountains height, Loud-founding, mad, whom rocks and woods delight: Nymphs od'rous, rob'd in white, whose streams exhale The breeze refreshing, and the balmy gale; With goats and pastures pleas'd, and beasts of prey, Nurses of fruits, unconscious of decay: In cold rejoicing, and to cattle kind, Sportive thro' ocean wand'ring unconfin'd: Nysian, fanatic Nymphs, whom oaks delight, Lovers of Spring, Pæonian virgins bright. With Bacchus, and with Ceres, hear my pray'r. And to mankind abundant favour bear; Propitious listen to your suppliants voice, Come, and benignant in these rites rejoice; Give plenteous Seasons, and sufficient wealth, And pour; in lasting streams, continued Health. Next: LI: To Trietericus Sacred Texts | Classics « Previous: The Initiations of Orpheus: XLIX: To Lysius Lenæus Index Next: The Initiations of Orpheus: LI: To Trietericus » Sacred Texts | Classics

The FUMIGATION from FRANKINCENSE. Brass-beating Salians, ministers of Mars, Who guard his arms the instruments of wars Whose blessed frames, heav'n, earth, and sea compose, And from whose breath all animals arose: Who dwell in Samothracia's sacred ground, Defending mortals thro' the sea profound. Deathless Curetes, by your pow'r alone, Initial rites to men at first were shewn: Who shake old Ocean thund'ring to the sky, And stubborn oaks with branches waving high. 'Tis your's in glittering arms the earth to beat, With lightly-leaping, rapid, sounding feet; Then every beast the noise terrific flies, And the loud tumult wanders thro' the skies: The dust your feet excites with matchless force, Flies to the clouds amidst their whirling course; And ev'ry flower of variegated hue, Grows in the dancing motion form'd by you. Immortal dæmons, to your pow'rs consign'd The talk to nourish, and destroy mankind. When rushing furious with loud tumult dire, O'erwhelm'd, they perish in your dreadful ire; And live replenish'd with the balmy air, The food of life, committed to your care. When shook by you, the seas, with wild uproar, Wide-spreading, and profoundly whirling, roar: The concave heav'ns, with Echo's voice resound, When leaves with ruffling noise bestrew the ground. Curetes, Corybantes, ruling kings, Whose praise the land of Samothracia sings: From Jove descended; whose immortal breath Sustains the soul, and wafts her back from death; Aerial-form'd, much-fam'd, in heav'n ye shine Two-fold, in heav'n all-lucid and divine: Blowing, serene, from whom abundance springs, Nurses of seasons, fruit-producing kings.

(34) more quickly and completely to "the fumes of enthusiasm." Three days before the time set to receive the communications from Apollo, the virgin priestess began the ceremony of purification. She bathed in the Castalian well, abstained from all food, drank only from the fountain of Cassotis, which was brought into the temple through concealed pipes, and just before mounting the tripod, she chewed a few leaves of the sacred bay tree. It has been said that the water was drugged to bring on distorted visions, or the priests of Delphi were able to manufacture an exhilarating and intoxicating gas, which they conducted by subterranean ducts and released into the shaft of the oracle several feet below the surface. Neither of these theories has been proved, however, nor does either in any way explain the accuracy of the predictions.

(30) The story of the original discovery of the oracle is somewhat as follows: Shepherds tending their flocks on the side of Mount Parnassus were amazed at the peculiar antics of goats that wandered close to a great chasm on its southwestern spur. The animals jumped about as though trying to dance, and emitted strange cries unlike anything before heard. At last one of the shepherds, curious to learn the cause of the phenomenon, approached the vent, from which were rising noxious fumes. Immediately he was seized with a prophetic ecstasy; he danced with wild abandon, sang, jabbered inarticulate sounds, and foretold future events. Others went close to the fissure, with the same result. The fame of the place spread, and many came to learn of the future by inhaling the mephitic fumes, which exhilarated to the verge of delirium.