NUMBER CXV.

THE Eleusynian Mysteries, instituted by Erechthonius, were celebrated in the time of autumn every fifth year at Eleusis, where a great concourse of people met upon the occasion: the ceremonies of initiation were preceded by sacrifices, prayers, and ablutions; the candidates were exercised in trials of secrecy, and prepared by vows of continence; every circumstance was contrived to render the act as awful and striking as possible; the initiation was performed at midnight, and the candidate was taken into an interior sacristy of the temple, with a myrtle garland on his head; here he was examined if he had duly performed his stated ablutions; clean hands, a pure heart, and a native proficiency in the Greek tongue were indispensible requisites; having passed this examination, he was admitted into the temple, which was an edifice of immense magnitude; after proclamation made that the strictest silence should be observed, the officiating priest took out the sacred volumes containing the mysteries; these books were written in a strange character interspersed with the figures of animals and various emblems and hieroglyphics; they were preserved in a cavity between two large blocks of stone, closely fitted to each other, and they were carefully replaced by the priest with much solemnity, after he had explained what was necessary to the initiated out of them. The initiated were enjoined to honour their parents, to reverence the immortal gods, and abstain from

particular sorts of diet, particularly tame fowls, fish, beans, and certain sorts of apples.

When this was finished, the priests began to play off the whole machinery of the temple in all its terror; doleful groans and lamentations broke out from the fane, thick and sudden darkness involved the temple, momentary gleams of light flashed forth every now and then with tremblings, as if an earthquake had shaken the edifice; sometimes the coruscations continued long enough to discover all the splendor of the shrines and images, accompanied with voices in concert, dancings and music: at other times, during the darkness, severities were exercised upon the initiated by persons unseen; they were dragged to the ground by the hair of their heads, and there beaten and lashed, without knowing from whom the blows proceeded, or why they were inflicted: lightnings and thunderings and dreadful apparitions were occasionally played off, with every invention to terrify and astonish; at length, upon a voice crying out Conx! Ompax! the ceremony was concluded and the initiated dismissed. The garment worn upon this occasion was not to be laid aside, whilst it would hang together, and the shreds were then to be dedicated at some shrine, as a tattered trophy of the due performancee of the mysteries of Ceres.

These initiations were conceived to lead to the enjoyment of a happier lot in this life, and to fit a man for a more dignified place amongst the blest hereafter; and they were in such general respect, that it afforded great cause of reproach against Socrates, for having neglected his initiation. The vows of secrecy, and the penalties to be inflicted on violation, were as binding as could possibly be devised.

Hitherto the rising state of Athens had not been engaged in war, but no sooner was it involved in disputes with the Eleusynians, on account of some predatory incursions, than the idea took its rise of devoting human victims to appease the hostile divinities, and to purchase conquest by the oblation of what was dearest and most valuable in life.

As we are now approaching towards the time of Homer, who records instances of this sort, it may be curious to mark when that savage superstition had its origin. No example occurs to me in Grecian story antecedent to Erechthonius, who, in obedience to an oracle, sacrificed one of his daughters, and some say all, to purchase thereby success against the Eleusynians. It is however a matter of less wonder than regret how this idea should obtain so generally; when a people are in the habit of making animal sacrifices a part of their worship, and whose religion it is to believe that intercession can be made to the gods, and favours obtained by the blood of victims taken from the brute creation, the thought of ascending a step higher in the dignity of the oblation, naturally leads to the hope of purchasing a greater reward. With these ideas enthusiastic spirits, like Decius and Curtius amongst the Romans, rushed upon self-destruction, and Erechthonius, king of Athens, devoted his daughters, Codrus himself- If the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood, &c. &c. &c.' There is a wild magnanimity in the idea highly captivating: Cicero more than once alludes to this action of Erechthonius, and in his oration for Sextus exclaims- Shall 1 after so many illustrious deeds shrink from death, which even the daughters of Erechthonius, with all the weakness of their sex about them, resigned them

selves to without regret?' Let the mind be possessed with the persuasion of immortal happiness annexed to the act, and there will be no want of candidates to struggle for the glorious prerogative. Erechthonius and his daughters were associated to the deities after their death, altars were dedicated and a temple erected to them in the citadel of Athens, where divine honours were paid to their memories. The Eleusynians were defeated and despoiled of all they possessed, except the mysteries of Ceres abovementioned; of these they were left in undisturbed enjoyment: their king Eumolpus was slain in battle, but Neptune, whose son he was, revenged his loss by striking his conqueror dead with his trident.

Thus perished Erechthonius by immortal hands, if we take the authority of Euripides the tragic poet, after he had reigned fifty years in Athens: in his time the people of Attica, heretofore called Cecropians, took the name of Athenians: Ovid, whose metamorphoses mix much ancient truth with fable, says that this prince at his death left it doubtful with posterity, whether he excelled most in justice as a King, or in military glory as a General.'

Ægeus, the reputed father of Theseus, was the eighth king of Athens, reckoning from Cecrops, and son of Pandion II. grandson of Erechthonius, the crown having descended regularly from father to son through several generations: after remaining childless for several years, he consulted the oracle at Delphi upon the mode of obtaining an heir; to a very plain question he obtained a very obscure answer, and, not being able to solve the ænigma him:self, consulted several persons upon the interpretation of it, and amongst others his friend Pittheus, king of Trazene, from whose sagacity he promised himself a solution of the difficulty: this wise prince had a daughter named Æthra, and she having ad

NUMBER CXIV.

THAT period of the Athenian history, which is included within the era of Pisistratus and the death of Menander the comic poet, may be justly styled the literary age of Greece. I propose to dedicate some of these papers to a review of that period; but as the earlier ages of poetry, though in general obscure, yet afford much interesting matter of inquiry, it will be proper to take up the Athenian history from its origin, because it is so connected with the account I mean to give, that I cannot otherwise preserve that order and continuation in point of time, which perspicuity requires.

This account may properly be called a history of the human understanding within a period peculiarly favourable to the production of genius; and, though I cannot expect that my labour will in the end furnish any thing more than what every literary man has stored in his memory, or can resort to in his books, still it will have the merit of being a selection uninterrupted and unmixed with other events, that crowd and obscure it in the original relations, to which he must otherwise refer. The wars, both foreign and domestic, which the small communities of Greece were perpetually engaged in, occupy much the greater part of the historian's attention, and the reader, whose inquiries are directed to the subject I am about to treat of, must make his way, through many things, not very interesting to an elegant and inquisitive mind, before he can dis cover,

Quid Sophocles et Thespis et Eschylus utile ferrent. Such will not envy me the labour of having turned over a heavy mass of scholiasts and grammarians,