The History of Initiation - The Masonic Trowel

104 HISTORY OF INITIATION.
of a future state. The unity of the godhead was incul-
49
cated and ; during the process
of celebration the following
truth was repeatedly proclaimed: "Jupiter is King;
he is the primitive source of all things there is ONE ; God ;
ONE power, and ONE Ruler over all!" 50 These disquisitions
were mixed up with the rhapsodies of Homer, 51 the
doctrines of purgatory, transmigration, and a series of
mythological allegories that darkly shadowed out the
52
events of the Deluge, accompanied with diffuse and mys-
Sanchoniatho also, were admitted to be acquainted with the Greatest
Mysteries, in the religious initiations of the heathens ; and that they
have truly told us that this worship of such great men as were the
founders of arts and civil government, was the grand secret of it ; which
was not communicated even to those that were initiated into the
Lesser Mysteries." (Cumb. Sanch., p. 348.)
49 Euseb. prasp. evan., 1. xiii. Cudw. Intell. Syst., c. iv., s. 18.
50 Proclus (in Tim., p. 95.) mentions a gem of Serapis,
which bears
an inscription to the same purport, Ets Zevs Zaqams, ONE Jupiter
Serapis. Many testimonies to this effect may be seen in Grotius. de
Veritate, 1. s. 10.
i.,
51 "
It is enacted that at the celebration of the Panathenaea majora,
Homer's rhapsodies be repeated." (Lycurg. in Leocr. Elian.)
53 To enumerate these legends would require a volume. The fable
of the Titans making war on Jupiter was an instance of the allegorizing
spirit of idolatry, for the rebellious Titans were no other than the
whole antediluvian race of mankind, except eight persons, who were
hence sometimes distinguished by the appellation of the just Titans;
Hesiod terms them gods. (Theog., v. 838.) The former by their impiety
set at defiance the divine power and justice, and were lost in
the Flood. To the same effect was the tradition of the contest between
Jupiter and the giants, in which the latter were destroyed. (Apollod.
Bibl., 1. i., c. 6.) The overthrow of Typhon was but a representation
of the return of the diluvian waters into their subterranean recesses.
(Ovid. Metam., 1. v.) The wanderings of lo, Isis, Rhea, Ceres, &c., as
we have already seen, were but figurative allegories of the erratic
and desultory voyage of the ark and the same event is referred ;
to in
the fable of the wanderings of Lysippa, Iphinoe, and Iphianassa. the
three daughters of Pretus or Minyas, who were struck with madness
for having despised the Bacchic mysteries. The murder of one of the
Cabiri by one of his brothers, like the death of Osiris and Bacchus,
related to the symbolical death of Noah. The expedition of the
Argonauts might have a reference to the Deluge, as Mr. Bryant and
the story of the birth of Bacchus
Mr. Faber are decidedly of opinion ;
amidst the thunder and lightning which destroyed his mother Semele ;
(Ovid. Metam., 1. Hi.) and his being enclosed in the thigh of Jupiter,
was only the fable of the Deluge, and the preservation of Noah in the
ark, for Arcch, an ark. and Yarech, a thigh, might easily, by the fanci-
ful genius of polytheism, be substituted the one for the other. (Vid.
Diod. Bibl., p. 123.) The descent of Hercules to hell, and the restoration
of Hyppolitus to life, were derived from the regeneration of