of the extraordinary care with which the native American protects his mystery-bag. This he has obtained under the influence of a mysterious inspiration, and so long as he retains it he has power over those spirits which he supposes to be embodied in the animals whose skins have been used in the formation of the bag; this, therefore, being equivalent to the rattle of the juggler or the ring of the magician.

"Viol

But these ideas are all reproduced in the sacred mysteries of more cultured peoples. The proposed initiant had to pass through various trials1 before he was admitted to the first grade of the mysteries and enrolled among its members. To prepare him for these trials he was fed on particular kinds of food, among them being figs and honey. The initiant was then made to submit to certain ordeals, such as passing through fire and water, enduring cold and hunger, thirst and fatigue. The Empress Eudocia (Macrembolista) in her arium," as quoted by Lajard, says, in relation to the Mithraic mysteries, that "no person can be admitted to the initiations unless he has previously passed through all the trials, and shown himself, at the same time, to be just and pious, and insensible to pain. The degrees of trial are eighty in number. [From Nicetas, this would appear to mean that they lasted eighty days]. Sometimes they are abated, and sometimes they progressively rise. At first the torments are lighter, then they become more violent, and it is only after having suffered all the trials that the initiant is admitted. These are some of the trials: Firstly, they oblige him to sustain hunger during fifty days, more or less, according to circumstances. Afterwards, if he bears patiently this trial, they make him cross water by swimming for several days; then he must throw himself into fire; then 1 Lajard, op. cit., p. 112, seq.; see further, infrà chap. "Mithraism."

plunge into snow during twenty days; after which, they (roughly) rub him for two days, and he remains in solitude without food. Finally, they make him suffer other torments of the same kind, until he has passed through the eighty trials as we have said. If it is proved that the patient has supported them with firmness, they admit him from that time to the most perfect initiation."

Those who successfully passed through these various ordeals were in a position to be admitted to be mysteries; they had attained to that mental condition which, like the ecstacy or inspiration of the mystery-doctor, fitted them to cope with the powers of darkness, the instruments of evil. These were in some sense symbolised by the animals used to designate the several grades of the mysteries. The powers against which the initiant had to fight were, however, analogous to those which the Christian knows as "the world, the flesh, and the devil." In the mysteries all moral evil was ascribed to the influence of the material principle with which the soul is united. Says Lajard: "Le corps était considéré comme le tombeau de l'âme. Dompter les passions charnelles, les maîtriser, triompher de la matière, c'etait donc pour l'âme, immortelle de la nature, triompher d'une mort passagère et renaître à la vie spirituelle, à l'immortalité."1 All matter, however, was not considered evil. In the Persian system, Ormuzd created a world which, although obscure, was pure. It was only the world which Ahriman created which was impure and buried in darkness. It was the attraction of this impure matter which the initiant was taught to resist, and this could only be by overcoming the prince of the powers of the air, who acted on the soul through the affections of the material body. This is exactly the same idea, more fully developed, as that which is em

1 Op. cit., p. 97.

bodied in the mystic rites of the Mongolian Shaman. The chief difference is that, in the teaching of the Oriental philosophy on which the mysteries were based, the invisible agents of the spirit world, so much dreaded by peoples of comparatively low culture, are represented by the Great Spirit of Evil who, like the Persian Ahriman, rules over the world of darkness. Victory over him is equivalent, therefore, to the overcoming of all inferior demons, who, according to the ideas of uncultured peoples, act independently and capriciously, but who, in the elaborated systems of the East, were subjected to the control of the Prince of Darkness. To secure that victory, however, it is necessary to resort to supernatural means; and, as in the simple ceremonies of the sorcery doctor, or Shaman, the soul is thought to be placed en rapport with the invisible agents of the spirit world, so, on initiation, the myst became placed in a certain special relation to the invisible being who was supposed to preside at the mysteries, and who was not only the Judge of the Dead, but the real Ruler of the Air.1

The general analogy thus shown between the ideas embodied in the rites observed in the mysteries, and those which entered into the simple teaching of the American mystery-lodge, is confirmed by a special point of agreement. In the peculiar ceremonies practised by the Mandans, as described by Catlin, the bull-dance occupies a very prominent position. In the course of it a curious performance takes place, which has for its object the ensuring of a sufficient supply of buffalos to

"the

1 It is not supposed that the ceremonies of the Indian lodge had associated with them the idea of a spiritual change, such as new birth" of the mysteries; but the severe trials of the Mandans had evidently a mystic significance, as the victims offered to the Great Spirit, with great earnestness and humility, one of their little fingers, which was chopped off near the hand.-(Catlin, op. cit., vol. i., p. 170.)

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provide food for the ensuing season.1 The strict observance of this ceremony, which from its character is evidently connected with the idea of fecundity, is thought to be necessary for this object. Now, there is nothing more remarkable than the universality of the association of that idea with the buffalo. During the festival with which the Chinese celebrate the return of spring, a paper image of the domestic buffalo, painted so as to represent the five elements of nature, is carried in procession, it being accompanied also by a live buffalo, which is afterwards killed and divided among the officials. Among the Kaffirs of South Africa a festival is held at the beginning of the year, when the maize is in a fit state for food; and in the ceremonies which precede the commencement of harvest a bull is sacrificed under peculiar circumstances, its flesh being eaten only by the "boys." That animal, according to the account given by Drury, takes a prominent part also in the rites of circumcision as practised by the Madecasses, the significance of that practice making it highly probable that the idea of fecundity was associated with the bull used in the ceremony. Among more civilised peoples the same ideas were also thus represented. In the cosmogony of Zoroaster, the general principles of which were so widely diffused among the ancients, the primeval bull is the first created being, and from its body, when it was slain by Ahriman, proceeded "the material prototypes of all the beings which live in the water, on the earth, and in the air." 5 Lajard points out that the Zend gaya, gava, or gueïé, signifies both life or soul and bull, a fact which explains why this animal or the cow,

1 Op. cit., vol. i., pp. 164, seq.

3 Grout's "Zululand," p. 161.

2 Doolittle, op. cit., p. 376.

4 Op. cit., p. 233. Compare with the Mandingo custom of offering prayers over a bull, described by Major Laing. See "Travels in Western Africa," p. 159.

5

Lajard, op. cit., p. 49.

which had similar ideas associated with it, was the emblem of so many deities in the mythologies of the ancients.1 In the Mysteries the bull symbolised the material life; the destruction of the primitive bull of Zoroastrianism, signifying that the soul which unites itself with matter gives life to the body but receives death, and will recover life or liberty only by the death of the body. According to the ancients, moreover, water or moisture is the seat or source of life; and hence the bull was also the symbol of the humid principle.3

4

It is deserving of notice that the bull and the cow were the animals in which Osiris and Isis, the great deities of the Egyptians, were thought to become incarnated. There is little doubt that the origin of this peculiar belief must be sought in the association of the idea of life with the buffalo. As was mentioned above, the name of Osiris was given to those who attained to spiritual re-birth; and it is not surprising, therefore, that among a people so addicted to animal-worship as the Egyptians, the buffalo was chosen as the living representative of the God of Life." Thus the bull-the figurative sign which follows the name of Apis-is accompanied by the crux ansata, the emblem of life, while Isis was expressly called by Plutarch "the place of generation." It is a remarkable circumstance that, although Osiris was a sun-god, yet Apis was said to be sacred to the moon. It would seem as though Osiris 1 See "Recherches sur le culte de Venus," p. 159, seq.; also Faber's "Pagan Idolatry," vol. i., p. 404, seq.

2 Lajard, "Le Culte de Mithra," p. 57.

3 Do., p. 185.

4 Wilkinson, op. cit,, vol. iv., pp. 347, 356, 381, seq. 5 Something of the same kind is probably associated with the sacred buffalo of India. In the Laws of Menu the Brahmans are said to be a constant incarnation of Dherma, the God of Justice (ch. i., v. 98), who would seem to be the same as the Genius of Truth and Right, who, in the Krita age, stands firm on his four feet in the form of a bull (ch. i. 81; viii. 16).

• Wilkinson, op. cit., vol. iv., p. 350.

7 Do., p. 382.

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