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I THE MAGE OF THE CROSS t0^t» on i\t lltar, ^^ IN TB E CHRrSTlAiN CHURCH, AND , HEATHEN TEMPLES BEFORE THE CHRISTIAN ERA. :'-?f -%," ' ESPfiCIALLY IN THE BRITISH ISI-ES. .. ■ JGETHER WITH THE HISTORY OF THE TRIANGEE, THE jj DOVE, FLORAE DECIORATIONS, THE EASTER EG(^,, ^i y AND OTHER HEATHEN SYMBOLS. is? ^^ i ■'V r ak ■* ^C'U^:^f:' if':,, ,;,.:;;; v*^ i' vr:v "CJod forbid that I f'liould glory, save in (thk ooctiune ok) • • the crops of our Lord Jesxis Christ." > . > "^ ,v— . "■ : , . v> ■■■■•■ .y ,'<^ >■. ■f ^^„ ...>■' .c •.■• "> , . .' J ,• •r^^''^'' jy ©ovont0: V HUNTER, ROSE & CO. NEW YORK: T. WHITTAKER, BIBIjE HOUSE. I 1 S i ; ' /- ■( MDCCCLXXIX. /. •>■■ • • 'Is'" r. \

% i i- .' "f^ xl -■^^'V.)i:-^ ■■^ • ■..'',.■■=■ .--^i-"'' ..^iV^~— -•■ V ' ^- ' '-■:•."-"" :>' .■"^^^■, "■■':>'^ ^^ '-".. /. -':,■ V" '-'•■• v\.,). .,.'-| « ,,.>■. ■ -•■(■, ■< ^« •-•■'-'.,■ • •■•' ^v- „.'"■■*■ V If, ., . «■<'••■, ■<, . ■ ■.(•'.,;•■/..■■ i\i> f,^ ■' , ' ., 'i • -■■ -t , , ■>-''i- .;■ '>%•■■>''■.;. ,- „ ..'<«.;<•?■•,•,.'■, -. «■;-■:■ \■' ■• n9 *^0 1 |!1'!|,t!+l'<'ViUjii,«. iMa!: • i i FBB-CHBISTIAN CROSS AT MEiaLE, SCOTLAND., I •• «« %m^i \ ;r]^r.vr5^?5?T^ THE IMAGE OF THE CROSS AND Itj^ts on t\^t lltar, IN THE CHRISTIAN OHUROH, AND m HEATHEN TEMPLES BEFORE THE CHRISTIAN ERA. ESPECIALLY IN THE BRITISH ISLES. TOGETHER WITH THE HISTORY OF THE TRIANGLE, THE DOVE, FLORAL DECORATIONS, THE EASTER EGG, AND OTHER HEATHEN SYMBOLS. "Gofl forbid that I should glory, save in (the nocTRTNE of) the cross of onr Lord Jesus (Christ." ®0fO(ttt0: HUNTER, ROSE & CO. NEW YORK : T. WHITTAKER, BIBLE HOUSE. MDCCCLXXIX. ill Entered according to the Act of the Parliament of Canada, in the year one thousaind eight hundred and seventy-nine, by Hunter, Rose & Co., in the office of the Minister of Agriculture. 66550 PniNTRD AKD BOUND BY HUNTER, ROSE & CO. TORONTO. ''t^Ji'.- fn «« •kfr'V Photomount ! year one & Co., in ILLUSTEATIOES. PAGE 1. Pre-Christian cross at Meigle, Scotland. From Sculptured Stonet of Scotland. Printed for the Spalding Club Frontispiece. 2. Isis holding forth the cross. From Wilkinson's Ancient Egyptians 11 3. Pre-Christian cross at Glammis, Scotland. From Sculptv/red Stones of Scotland ., 13 4. Druidical Cruciform Temple. From ItogAn's Scottish Oael 16 5. Ancient Egyptian Fraying, holding a cross in each hand. From Champollion-le-j8- Monuments de VEgypte 19 6. Medal of the Emperor Constantine, with the Chi-rho (and not the cross) on his helmet. From Ward's History of the Cross 21 7. Ancient Egyptians, adorned with crosses. From Wilkinson 24 8. Bacchus, with head-band adorned with crosses- From Hislop's Two Babylons •"■...... 33 9. Druid's or Easter Egg, found in the Netherlands. From Arend, Gesch. des Vaderlands ,, 64 I 1 .,,; i jf . t >'i^ .5 I-. If; ^ ' - 7> . ■ ■ -"'■ '^rr :" !, i»^- " > •m^rie- /hf: St.'**- |JV«>;.^^?',V?Vl,'.l?;f/?'.'^' Photomount Pe Jmage of tge ^^oss. ,N a memoir of the celebrated Bible Commentator, the Rev. Matthew Henry, it is stated that when he was baptized in 1662, by the Rector of Malpas, his father, Philip Henry, requested that the sign of the cross might be dispensed with. It being urged that such an omission was impossible, Philip Henry said to the in- cumbent : " Then, Sir, let it be at your door !" Although our English Reformers ordered all crosses, whether carved or painted, to be defaced and destroyed ; for they considered them to be images or likenesses for the use of religion, and therefore contrary to the Second Commandment ; they unfortunately retained the sign of the cross in the baptismal service ; but the wisdom of their course was soon doubted, and half a century later it was deemed necessary to explain " The lawful use of the cross in baptism " in the Canons of 1603, and a feebler defence could hardly have been made, for it is therein stated that the name of the cross was reverently esteemed even in the Apostles' time, and the sign was used shortly after, "for aught that is knoiun to the contrary.'' If the Convocation knew nothing to the contrary, we cannot plead the same ignorance ; for it is most certain that the cross is the Pagan sign or initial of Tammuz or Bacchus, who is mentioned in Ezekiel (viii. 14) : " And behold there sat the women weeping for Tammuz ; " and was not introduced into the Christian Church until long 8 The Image of the Cross. k'?*." ■i r/ter the time of the Apostles, who gloried in the doc- trine of the cross, and not in the sign or image of what St. Paul considered an accursed tree ; in contradiction to whom Romanists and Ritualists call it a Holy tree ! Equally true is it that there is not the slightest proof whatever that our blessed Lord and Saviour suffered on a cross formed of two sticks crossing each other, for Stauros, a pale fixed upright, a stake, and Xulon, a stick, piece of timber or a tree, are the only words used in the Greek Testament, and malefactors were often crucified on a straight post with the hands nailed above the head. The initial T (tau), sometimes crossed below the top like our small t, is the same as our T, and was a sacred symbol of Heathendom long prior to the Christian Era. In England the Druids made and adored crosses of oak trees in honour of their Baal, which signifies Lord, and their lord was Tammuz, who was probably worship- ped in Britain long before Ezekiel complained that the Jewish women had become corrupted and wept for him, for Timagenes, a Greek historian who flourished about B. C. 51, is quoted by Ammianus Marcellinus as saying that the Kelts had a tradition that they were descendants of the Trojans ; and Diodorus Siculus, about B. C. 44, says, " The Britons lead the life of the ancients, making use of chariots in battle, such as they say the ancient heroes used in the Trojan war." Troy was burnt six cen- turies before the time of Ezekiel. The river Thames, as well as the Tamar, Tame and Teme probably received their names from Thammuz or Tammuz. I have seen other etymons, but am satisfied with this, which was I think first suggested by Rawlin- son, especially as it is well known that rivers and foun- tains were dedicated to the Sun, and Tammuz was the Sun-god. Tammuz was fabled to have been slain by a wild boar, which animal was offered in sacrifice to him. In England I i I «• mt %m^f^ .■■T»;;=r ;, .•^•^p^t'T^ rrfil Photomount The Image of the Cross. 9 a THE DOC- e of what iiction to ree! est proof ered on a * Stauros, , piece of he Greek led on iad. the top a sacred }ian Era. es of oak is Lord, worship- that the for hiro, d about 'S saying sendants J. C. 44, making ancient six cen- me and tiniuz or satisfied Rawlin- d foun- vas the Id boar, 'ngland the boar's head soused was anciently the first dish on Christmas Day, and was carried up to the principal table in the hall with great state and solemnity. Wynkin de Worde, in 1521, printed the carol commenc- ing, " The Bore's Heade in hande bring I, with garlands gay and rosemary," as it was sung in his time. The boar's head and this carol are still retained at Oxford, al- though the reason of the custom is long forgotten ; but can any one doubt that it dates from the time of our Pagan ancestors from whom also we derive the practice of decking our churches and houses with evergreens, and even with mistletoes, that most sacred emblem of the Druids. At Whiteleaf, in Buckinghamshire, England, is a cross one hundred feet long, cut in the face of the chalk hill in the same manner as the white horses of Wilts and Berks, and which may, therefore, be of as late a date as the time of King Alfred, by whom the two horses are supposed to have been graven, but it is equally probable that they were all the work of the Ancient Britons ; for the horse, or rather a proud-crested mare, was a mystical symbol of Ceredwen, the British Ceres, and is found on the coins of Cunobeline, Boadicea, and others. In Scotland there are numerous sculptured stones, some of which are elaborately wrought, and decorated fre- quently with various mystic symbols of constant recur- rence, which Wilson says " still remain an enigma to British antiquaries." I trust it will not be considered presumption on my part in offering an explanation of some of them. Many are in all probability pre-Christian, upon which the cross of Tammuz is frequently found combined with serpents, boars, hogs or sows, elephants, lions, fishes, birds, crescents, mirrors like the sign of the planet Venus, and with certain other signs, among them being the peculiar Z symbol, and also the V, one end of which often ends in a " heraldic " lily (of Juno ?). Some III! ■IT;T i ' 1 IV: ■ V ' . 1 It"''' Ui T ■■ ''in f \ - J* '^'■i !! H ■ ' ^ 1 ' 1 3S t 10 The Image of the Gross. of these are engraved in Wilson's " Prehistoric Scotland " (London, 1863). On some silver ornaments found at Norrie's Law, co. Fife, the Z symbol has a fleur-de-lis at one end, and there is also a cross in a circle, Venus's looking-glass with a lily handle, and what may have been intended to represent either the ear of com of Ceres, or the thyrsus, or ivy branch, attribute of Bacchus. A few coins were found with these relics, one of which proved to be of an Emperor Valentin, the last of whom died A.D. 455. The serpent was a symbol of Tammuz as the Serpent- sun-god ; the boar was also sacred to him, the sow was sacrificed by the Romans to Ceres, and the hog in Scandi- navia to Frigga, wife of Odin, and probably also in Scot- land to Astarte who was identical with Frigga. The lion was emblematic in some countries of the Sun, and the crescent was the well-known emblem of Astartfe. It would be interesting could we discover the meaning of the fish symbol. Can it have any reference to Dagon, the well-known Fish-god ? One of the names of Bacchus was Bacchus Ichthys, or " The fish," and the meaning of the word " Dagon " in Hebrew is " a fish ;" and Jerome, moreover, calls Dagon, Piscem mmroris, *' The fish of sor- row" which strongly resembles the " Lamented One " or BacchuSjfrom the Phoenicean" hacchos" weeping. The two- horned pontifical mitre is the very mitre of the Dagon of the Philistines. In profile it is the fish's head with the mouth open. In Layard's " Babylon and Nineveh " (p. 343) is an engraving of Dagon, found at Nineveh, xepresented as robed in the skin of a fish, the head as the mitre, the skin on his back and the tail behind his feet. Perhaps the fish of this monument is intended to represent the one which Neptune placed among the con- stellations, "When the early Christians adopted the fish as an em- blem of our Blessed Lord it was done in that fatal spirit i - ".•»>"«V',lf^"""i''' M •• «• m*"^ It I a '%:*<' iar- Photomount The Image of the Cross. 11 •Gotland " found at ■de-lis at , Venus's lave been Ceres, or A few h proved lom died Serpent- sow was I Scandi- in Scot- The lion and the meaning Dagon, Bacchus ining of Jerome, of sor- 3ne " or 'he two- >agon of nth the neveh " ineveh, head as lind his ided to he con- an em- \1 spirit of compromise then so common — to make the heathen think there was but little difference between the two religions. As regards the birds on these sculptured stones it is sometimes difficult to distinguish the species, but the dove is probably among them, as it was also an emblem of Astartfe. Juno means " The Dove," and as Queen of Heaven Astartfe was identical with Juno. The lily which we too often see preserved in Protestant Churches, in stained windows, carpets, and the like, was also sacred to Juno, and is still sacred in the Roman Catholic Church to the Virgin Mary. Astartfe, who was also the same as Venus, was the con- sort of Tammuz. She was the Ishtar of Nineveh, the Isis of Egypt, the Astoreth and Succoth Benoth* of back- * 2 Kings xvii. 30, This is generally interpreted tents, or booths, but thQ preceding verse proves the contrary — " they majiie gods of their own. mm »4i| !'-/• ■ !i n fi b 12 T^ Image of the Cross. sliding Israel, the great Diana of the Ephesians, and the Saxon Eoster, from which is derived our term Easter. In fact, all the numerous deities of the ancient heathen world were originally the same. In the Orphic Hymns it is expressly so declared, and Porphyry acknowledged that Vesta, Rhea, Ceres, Themis, Priapus, Proserpine, Bacchus, Adonis, Silenus, and the Satyrs were all one and the same, and he is good authority. He was him- self a Pagan and a Platonic philosopher who died in Rome in 304. Arnobius tells us that in praying they often said, " Oh, Baal, whether thou be a god or goddess, hear us." Is the dove in our churches placed there as an emblem of Astarte or Easter, or is it intended as an emblem of that Holy Spirit for sinning against whom such an awful doom is pronounced ? As a religious symbol it is against the laws ecclesiastical and the laws of God, for the Decla- ration of 1559 expressly forbids the emblem of the Holy Ghost in the form of a dove, and the Second Command- ment forbids all likenesses or similitudes for religious purposes. At Meigle, in Scotland, is a cross engraved on a stone, and above each limb is a boar and a hog or sow, evidently the symbols of Tammuz and Astarte, with other figures, (see Frontispiece,) and on the reverse, a fish, serpent, mirror, men and horsemen, and the peculiar Z figure, sometimes styled a sceptre ; and on another stone in the same place is a centaur, bearing in each hand an object, one of which at least appears to be a cross, and under his arm, extending beyond the horse's back, is a branch. This may possibly refer to tree worship, which generally accompanied the sun and serpent worship. At Glammis, is another cross, with a lion above one limb, which was the emblem of the Sun-god under the name of Mithra, opposite to which is a centaur, holding, not the bow, but a battle-axe in each hand. This may have been intended to represent SI m «B^«« m Photomount ans, and the m Easter, lent heathen phic Hymns knowledged Proserpine, '^ere all one e was him- 'ho died in -aying they or goddess, an emblem emblem of 2h an awful t is against ' the Decla- >f the Holy Command- er religious on a stone, , evidently figures, (see nirror, men imes styled place is a ■ which at extending ly possibly panied the ►ther cross, e emblem pposite to battle-axe ' represent I PRE-CHRISTIAN CROSS AT GLAMM18, SCOTLAND. III U ''ft I i II V I >1 I i t I '■ if Hi - ! If " ? if I I I 14 T^e Image of the Cross. > ! • Centaurus himself, who was a son of Apollo, the Sun-god, who was another form of Tammuz. King Malcolm was murdered at Glammis, according to some histories, and the murderers were drowned in endeavouring to escape; but there are three different accounts of his death. So little are these monuments understood that this cross is called King Malcolm's grave- stone, while in the " Statistical Account of Scotland" (Vol. IX.) it is said that the lion and centaur are supposed to represent the shocking barbarity of the crime, and the fish on the reverse to be symbolical of the lake in which the murderers were drowned. Fish, however, frequently oc- cur on these stones, in connection with which it may be added that Dio and Herodian expressly state that the Caledonians did not eat fish !* There is another cross near Glammis also associated by tradition with King Malcolm, but upon it are two small animals, apparently fawns, and two long-tailed animals, probably panthers, and if so, it is evidently a Pagan cross, for the spotted fawn (ne- bros) was a symbol of Bacchus as representing Nebrod or Nimrod himself, and upon certain occasions in the mysti- cal celebrations, the fawn was torn to pieces in imitation of the sufferings of Bacchus or Osiris. The panther was also sacred to Bacchus, because on one of his expeditions he was covered with a skin of that beast. There are similar sculptured stones in the Isle of Man of as late a date as the eleventh century, accompanied by Runic inscriptions. That most of the Scotch stones have none tends to prove their earlier origin, as the Druids * Had it been said that the two men in the cauldron (see plate) were symbolical of the drowning it would not have been surprising. Perhaps this scene gave rise to the tradition. Strange pictures abound on these stones, animals devouring each other, men devoured by animals, hunting scenes, nondescript monsters, and even human forms with animal heads, reminding one of the Egyptian divinities. A man tearing open the jays of a rampant lion (Wilson, vol. ii. p. 235) bears a resemblance to the Assyrian Hercules wrestling with a lion, from a Lycian monimient engraved in Layard's Nineveh, for although the Scotch Hercules is armed with a sword, he does not use the weapon. Cl tl 1 1 I ! j(i T - ' ■ ' } ' ' - j ■ ■■" ' TfSRfri & vbM Photomount The Image of the Cross. 15 the Sun-god, s, according drowned in -ee different monuments olm's grave- fcland" (Vol. supposed to and the fish I which the squently oc- h it may be te that the r cross near ig Malcolm, fawns, and and if so, fawn (ne- Nebrod or the mysti- i imitation mther was xpeditions jle of Man ipanied by iones have ihe Druids e plate) were ng. Perhaps and on these lals, hunting aimal heads, n the jays of the Assyrian engraved in irith a sword, I either absolutely forbade the use of letters, or at least considered them unlawful in matters of religion, and they had therefore wonderful memories, for their youth were obliged to learn and repeat a vast number of lines, some say as many as 20,000 at a time, and were willing to remain under tuition as much as twenty years. Among the many ancient stone crosses, it is often ini- possible to distinguish the Pagan from the Christian, for the Christians appear to have continued to employ the same tracery, and sometimes even the same orna- ments and symbols. One Scotch cross bears upon it a a man and woman, with a tree between them, which might be taken for a Christian representation of Adam and Eve ; but there is a similar sculpture in the temple of Osiris at Phyloe, which is beyond doubt, an Egyptian delineation of the same subject. It has been supposed that the crosses of lona, originally 360 in number, are Pagan, and it is by no means impro- bable, as lona was a sacred isle of the Druids before the arrival of Columba. The number, which seems to refer to the revolution of the sun, is given in a MS. of the year 1693, and may be derived from a traditionary ac- count of the number in the time of the Druids, after whom the isle is still sometimes called Innis nan Dru- idhneach (Isle of the Druids). There were, however, many crosses of later date, and one still preserved bears upon it the year 1489. At Callernish, in the Lewis, is a cruciform Druidical temple (see plate), and there is a cruciform structure near Culloden, generally called five cairns, but Wilson says it may be more accurately described as one gigantic cruci- form cairn. There is also a work of the same shape in Ireland, at New Grange, another at Dowth, and Wayland Smith's cave in Berkshire, England, is likewise cruciform. Two of the principal pagodas in India, viz., those of Ben- ares and Mathura are also built in the form of a cross. Iltlj .'■>'''<, If! t ■ ■ •• ?<■: . :^' ti >< U The Image of the Cross. •■< > t ';■ , DRUIDIOAL CRUCIFORM TEMPLE. Three-armed cruciform cromlechs (T) are common in Denmark. In the Scotch Highlands, a fiery cross was used from time immemorial to as late as the rising of 1745, to call the clans together in time of war. It was a cross of wood, the extremities of which were seared in fire, and .viw«trTt)r'T' Wi Ww»«i i >; w www*i WfcH i««^TY<»ttTv^A-t>>.Prtig'r^ »*»rk.^'.Lij?^! ■?^.'"9' Photomouni The Image of the Gross, IT common m s used from 1745, to call /S a cross of in fire, and extinguished in the blood of a goat, which was killed by the chief himself, with his own sword, and the cross was then sent throughout the country with the utmost celerity. ;^ This fiery cross was called cran-tara and crois-tara ; ; supposed to signify the tree or cross of shame (tair), in ■allusion to the baseness of those who neglected to join the banner of their chief. It seems to me, however, far more likely that the original signification has been for- gotten, and that it must have been the cross of Taran or Thoran, the god of Thunder, who was identical with the I Scandinavian Thor, whose weapon was a fylfot cross, the j same as the Sanscrit suastika, which from the remotest || times, was one of the most sacred of the Aryan symbols, I Thor's weapon was called his hammer, and was a fiery cross because it denoted the lightning, and from its con- stantly emitting flashes could only be grasped by a steel glove. Thor's symbols of his hammer, glove and magic girdle are often found on pre-Christian monuments in Scandinavia. It must be noted, moreover, that the goat was sacred to Bacchus, and as the car of Thor was drawn by two goats, it was presumably also sacred to Thor, and in Scotland to Taran, and if so, the killing of the animal with so much ceremony, by the chief himself, with his own sword, was originally, in all probability, intended as a sacrifice to that god. Schliemann found crosses of various descriptions on Trojan articles. A.mong them the fylfot or suastika fre- quently occurred. He says in his " Troy," (London, 1875), that the suastika was a large fire-machine, the fire being produced by friction, thus : The cross beams were placed on the ground horizontally, and a piece of wood named Pramantha dropped perpendicularly in a central hole, and worked by a string, produced the sacred fire. This fire was a god called Agni, and his mother, the Suastika, was the goddess Maya, Cybele or Venus. From this Praman- B ■I i !i I ' u m ki*- • ^' «B^' ■•V,' wt "tmt Photomount The Image of the Cross. 19 Prometheus the Sun. irms, is very is probably from Shaw's contagious e is extin- y force fire wood upon tails of the bout them. re-kindled )ne ; and it lete in the ig could we ces only — a oubt of its le married I, by turns, J produced, ed from it. itane cakes Tein-egin, ar * booth, LUgur, pro- ich it was lid be col- e the top of the cross, and both gods and mortals were frequently represented as carrying the cross in their hands, holding it by this circle. This cross was called in Latin " crux ansatal* cross with a handle. i In the Hunehedden (Giants' graves), in the Province of Drenthe, Netherlands, round stones of the size of a hen's Qgg have been found bearing on them crosses in circles.* The cross in the circle is one of the so-called " orna- mental " crosses which Romanists and Romanizers still revere, for they place them in their churches as religious emblems, as emblems of their faith, and they look upon them therefore with reverence ; but reverence to an idol is akin to worshipping it. * Arend. Alg. Geschiedenis des Vaderlands, Amsterdam, 1841. tMi- i ' ■ i 1 1 j 1 1 1 i i , ! 1 1 ■4 .1 " 1 t ! Ii i I 20 The Image of the Civss. No writer of the age and the school of the Apostles ever mentions or alludes to any sign, image or form of the Pagan cross, except a certain writer under the assumed name of Barnabas, whose Epistle most critics consider to be the production of an unknown author who published it under the name of the fellow labourer of St. Paul. He is followed by the counterfeit Nicodemus, in the so-called Gospel of Nicodemus. These writers seem to have been half -converted heathens who forged the names of good men to give weight to their crude ideas. Such forgeries were common. Of the fifteen Epistles ascribed to Ignatius, eight are now universally condemned and only three are generally allowed. Justin Martyr (died about 165) is the first known writer after the Apostles who speaks of the form of the cross, which he evidently takes with other crudities from the hands) of the pseudo Barnabas, and half a century later M. Minutius Felix speaks favourably of it, as does also Tertullian who died A.D. 225, whose language seems to admit that the sign of , the wood of the cross, or a like- ness of the cross in wood, was worshipped in the third century,both by Christians and Pagans. The Rev. Mr. Ward ("History of the Cross," London and Philadelphia, 1871) gives their exact words which are too long to quote here and concludes, " Barnabas, Nicodemus and Justin mag- nify the power of the sign, but give no hint of worship- ping the cross ; which worship Minutius and Tertullian agree to justify before the heathen. Thus the wonder grew ' with all deceivableness of unrighteousness ' till at length all Christendom was enveloped in delusion." Tertullian, however, at another period bitterly lament- ed the inconsistency of Christians ; and, when blaming them for taking part in the Pagan festivals, says : " Oh, how much more faithful are the heathens to ^Ae^r religion, who take special care to adopt no solemnity from the Christians." *!• ^. ^,«. ■■ ■> i: ;• I •.'V ^■:> f :! li ■lM,j, ^ 3 1 '• i! :' 24 T^e Image of the Cross. until A,D. 370. Dean Burgon said in 1861, in his Letters from Rome, " I question whether a cross occurs on any Christian monument of the first four centuries." Since then, however, this one has been found of the year 370. Hislop says the Pagan symbol seems first to have crept into the Christian Church in Egypt, which was never thoroughly evangelized, and generally into Africa ; but Egypt appears to have taken the lead ; and the first form of that which is called the Christian cross found on Chris- tian monuments there is the unequivocal Pagan Tau or Crux Ansata, the Egyptian " Sign of Life." Sir Gardner Wilkinson says, the early Christians of Egypt adopted this Tau in lieu of the cioss, which was afterwards substi- tuted for it. That the sign of Tammuz was a cross is indubitable. The vestal virgins of Pagan Rome wore it suspended from their necklaces, as the nuns do now, and Wilkinson proves that it was already in use in Egypt as early as the fifteenth century before the Chris- tian era, and both men and women frequently had a small cross sus- pended to a necklace or to the collar of their dress ; but I repeat it, there is not the slightest proof whatever that our blessed Saviour was exe- cuted upon a cross of the same form. He suffered for our sakes the death of a common malefactor ; and crimi- nals, as we have seen, were often crucfiied upon straight posts or pales, with the hands nailed above the head. That our Saviour suffered in that way is not a new supposition; for in a work by the learned antiquarian, Joost Lips (Lipsius), published in Lou vain in 1605, He is repre- sented as crucified in that manner. It was engraved in m Photomount The Image of the Cross. 25 his Letters urs on any ies." Since year 370. have crept was never \.frica; but e first form d on Ghris- gan Tau or )ir Gardner pt adopted irds substi- ndubitable. inded from Wilkinson arly as the \the Chris- nd women cross sus- ) the collar at it, there whatever • was exe- same form, the death and crimi- v^ere often ts or pales, '6 the head. d in that ition; for oost Lips is repre- graved in The Mock newspaper last year. Crosses as instruments of punishment were formerly used in marvellous numbers, so that it can hardly be supposed they would be parti- cular about the form of them. Varus crucified 2,000 Jews, Hadrian 600 a day, and Titus so many, " that there was no room for the crosses and no crosses for the bodies." At the period of the Revolution in England, a Royal Commission, appointed to inquire into the rites and cere- monies of the Church, numbering among its members eight or ten bishops, strongly recommended that the use of the cross in baptism, as tending to superstition, should be laid aside. When the Prayer Book of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America was revised in 1789, a rubric was added, permitting the minister to omit making the sign of the cross, if desired. The Reformed Episcopalians went a step further, and according to their Prayer Book (Philadelphia, 1874), the sign is not to be made except when it is desired, but in the Book of the Prayer Book Revision Society (London, 1874), of which Lord Ebury is President, the sign of the cross is entirely omitted. Strange to say, however, it is retained in the new Prayer Book of the Church of Ireland (Dublin, 1878), al- though it has therein been deemed necessary not only to print an apologetical note at the end of the Baptismal Service, but also the whole of the Thirtieth Canon of the year 1603. Nevertheless, although they retain the cross in their service, and defend its use there by the old canon, they have dropped from the Calender the " Invention of the Cross " (May 3) and " Holy Cross Day " (Sept. 14). Their own Thirty-sixth Canon is as follows : — " There shall not be any cross on the Communion Table, or on the covering thereof, nor shall a cross be erected or depicted on the wall or other structure behind the Communion Table," and the Thirty-ninth Canon forbids carrying any In Mil" itiiJ Li 26 '• if] I, If ? ': I in :%:• him I': Ml 11 ' 1 '>,.•'' ■■'V I ■ ; '■'v. - 'i; y^:)f 1 1! ill i?< -;. ,. : fy, but now rhere h& has ireekly com- ith, and ap- behind the vil," and de- lot be any. the body of they were removal of ould be no ipproved of Close pub- ches is the [•ue prophet. I have it before me now,* as well as a critique " Pusey- ite Developments," bought in 1850, at about which time I first began to take particular notice of the proceedings of the Ritualistic Dissenters, as Hely Smith calls them. Too many, as I well remember, considered their innova- tions as trifles then, and, alas ! too many consider them as trifles still. •In Scotland the Reformation was more perfect than in England. Not only was the cross removed from the churches, but ^he sign was omitted in baptism, and even the hot-cross-bun of Good Friday w^as abolished ! And here, before ejaculating " Absurd," let the reader pause — for the only difference between the English Churchmen of to-day and the Pagans of old, is that while the Church- men still eat their cross-buns, the Pagans, centuries before Christ, offered them first to Tammuz ! These buns which were called in the Greek "boun," were consecrated to Bacchus and were used in his mysteries.*]* Two were found at Herculaneum, one of which was engraved in "The Rock" not long since. There were several kinds of sacred bread, which used to be offered up to the gods, one of which, a thin, round cake now represented by the wafer used in the Romish Mass, was called KdUyris, and is the one re- ferred to in Jeremiah (vii. 18), " The women . . . make cakes to the Queen of Heaven," or Astartd." The heathen cross originated in Babylon and from thence reached to the uttermost parts of the earth, includ- ing even the so-called New World, for the Spaniards, to * I am happy to say the Dean has just allowed his publisher to issue a new edition. t The reader cannot but notice the frequent repetition of the word " mys- teries," which was the essence of the Pagan religion. The term '" mystery " is never applied to the sacrament in Holy Writ, and it is, to say the least, unfortunate, that we have it in our Prayer Book, for where, except to a believer in the real presence, is the mystery in the bread and wine ? In the Book of the P. B. Revision Society the words " holy mysteries " are altered to "holy ordinance," and in that cf the R. E. Church to "Holy Supper." iiTi:!: \V 28 HM^ 1 1 >■; u,i i! II' \ A3 S ^ il -I: ■ ., ■ ■.; Ir, M •I P I Mi ,' i ■• J T^e Image of the Cross. their surprise, found crosses in Mexico, and moreover, the Mexicans carried them in processions. Are we any wiser in this nineteenth century : " Now a gilt cross on Dora's prayer-book shines, As toward the Church her solemn step inclines ; Now from her neck one dangles in the dance, As if thereby she heavenward claimed advance." An English evangelist, who was here about three years ago, said he had seen more pictorial and other crosses in the United States of America and Canada than in Eng- land, and principally to his surprise in the houses of Methodists ! And yet his visits were confined to Pro- testants, in name at least. There are some whose excuse for wearing the image of the cross is, that it is the sign of the Son of man which is to appear at the time of the Second Coming, and others that it is the mark referred to in Ezekiel (ix. 4.), but in the first instance the sign (whatever it may be) is to ap- pear in Heaven, not on earth, and it is the sign of our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, not of sinful man ; and in the second^ the mark (which some believe to be a tau cross, but who can surely tell) is to be made by the man appointed for the work, not by the sinner himself, who is not to be his own judge. If the sign and the mark are both crosses, as some think, which is it the most likely to be — the cross-shaped letter c/ii (X) for Xt., or the ac- cursed tree ? The floral crosses that hang on so many of our walls, are similar to those of the ancient Manicheans, and to this day a flowery cross is a favourite emblem of the Buddhists, The cross in the hand of Hera, the Assyrian Venus (vide Layard's " Nineveh ") appears to have a single leaf issu- ing from each side. In the Roman Catholic " Oflice of the Cross " we read, " Hail, Cross .... among the trees there is none like thee, in leaf, flower and bud,^' and in " Hymns Ancient and Modern," " None in foliage, none i .1 III i 1^!^ Photomount The Image of the Cross. 29 d moreover, the itury : nes, lines ; 36, mce. out three years >ther crosses in J, than inEng- the houses of >nfined to Pro- ig the image of . of man which ling, and others . (ix. 4.), but in ly be) is to ap- )he sign of our man; and in re to be a tau ide by the man himself, who is i the mark are ! most likely to ^t, or the ac- y of our walls, ans, and to this 'the Buddhists, an Venus (vide ingle leaf issu- lolic " Office of . among the and hud,^' and nfoliage^ none in blossom, none in fruit, thy peer may be," and yet St. Paul called it accursed ! Some among us paint wheat ears in the church win- dows as emblems of the bread, and fill their churches with them at harvest festivals, but are they not emblems of Isis or Ceres, still to be found on medals or coins as clas- sical scholars well know, and do not the Romanists in one of their litanies pray to that very corn, " Bread corn of the elect, have mercy upon us ? " Corn must have been also sacred to Dagon, who was sometimes called the Corn- giver {Dagon os esti Siton). The Druids were devoted worshippers of Ceridwen, the British Ceres, and they were celebrated in their mystic poems, as " bearers of the ears of corn." Here again we perceive early traditions misunderstood, and perverted more and more, as men departed from the truth, and so far was it carried that the Mexicans, who had a deity called Centeotl, the daughter of heaven and goddess of corn, offered children in sacrifice at the first appearance of green corn above the earth ! In Leviticus (ii. 14.) God's people are commanded to offer for their offerings " green ears of corn," but harvest offerings and harvest festivals are needless now, and worse than needless, for they are no pleasure to Him who, nine- teen centuries ago, by one offering, once offered, perfected forever them that are sanctified, and the Word to us is " Sacrifice and offering and burnt offerings and offer- ing for sin Thou ivouldest not, neither hadst pleasure therein." The mention of painted windows reminds me that the late Count Krasinski understood perfectly the danger of introducing images and paintings into the church. " It was (he said) replacing intellect by sight. Instead of elevating man towards God, it was bringing down the Deity to the level of his finite intellect." And Ruskin says : '* A picture in coloured glass is one of the most vulgar of 'W N 1 1 Mil k'.i'hi ^1 if ;l' I li 30 The Image of the Cross. barbarisms and only jfit to be ranked with the gauze transparencies and chemical illuminations of the sensa- tional stage." And still, so prone are we to see only the mote in our brother's eye, that we all look with scornful pity upon the bigotry of the French Canadians, and upon what oc- curred in the Province of Quebec not very long since, when in one of the principal cities they set up new gas- lamp posts with the usual cross-bar to support the lamp- lighter's ladder (which the old posts did not have), and the habitants as they came in from the country thought the towns-people were suddenly becoming exceedingly pious, and stopped and crossed themselves before every lamp-post. The Second Commandment is the only commandment accompanied by a curse — and it is a most fearful one — but it is accompanied also by a blessing. Shall your chil- dren inherit the curse or the blessing ? It depends upon yourselves, " And the Lord spake unto you .... ye heard the voice of the words, but satv no similitude " " Take ye therefore good heed unto yourselves ; for ye saiv no m,anner of similitude on the day that the Lord spake unto you. . . . ." " Lest ye corrupt yourselves, and make you a graven imsige, the similitude of any figure " " Take heed unto yourselves, lest ye forget the covenant of the Lord your God, which he made with you, and make you a graven image, or the likeness of anything, which the Lord thy God hath given thee. " When thou shalt beget children, and children's chil- dren, and ye shall have remained long in the land, and shall corrupt yourselves, and make a graven image, or the likeness of anything, and shalt do evil in the sight of the Lord thy God I call heaven and earth to witness against you " 4 i rsa « ■^^t «■ ^/ «l^ jfsm Photomount the gauze the sensa- Lote in our pity upon n what 00- ong since, p new gas- , the lamp- iiave), and L'y thought Kceedingly ifore every mandment rful one — your chil- ends upon heard the >> i^es ; for ye , the Lord U a graven I covenant you, and anything, ren's chil- land, and age, or the ght of the to witness CtgOts on tOe Ma^. !i:i |HESE are, of course, only to be found in Roman Ca- tholic or Puseyite churches, for no church can be called truly Protestant where there are either lights for ceremonial purposes, or an altar, although it must be confessed in too many Evangelical churches we still see the tables boxed up like sham altars, instead of being " move- able tables, in the ordinary sense of the word," as the Queen's Privy Council decided was the meaning of the Act of the year 1564. The imitation altars were first introduced in the time of Archbishop Laud, and the laity, although disapproving of them, carelessly allowed them to pass, simply expressing their dislike by styling them " Box Altars." At the same time, too, the priest-party commenced to turn the desks sideways, because, as they said, the priest should face the people when reading or preaching, but when speaking to God, he should turn and face Him. Thus localizing the Deity as if He was not present everywhere, but only to be found on the table, or in one particular corner of the Heavens ; and, moreover, making it necessary for travel- lers to carry compasses ! With the reading desk in its proper position, a lectern is useless, for as a writer in The Mock said lately, " What reason is there in moving from one place to another to conduct different parts of the Protestant service of our Church ? " ria»i , ' lijii '-li- ! p^l h ill 1)1! I IL^ f ! f' ! I 32 Lights on the Altar. The Jews prayed towards the Temple because the She- kinah was there, but there is no Shekinah on earth now and therefore no Holy of Holies. The Mahoramedans turn to Mecca to pray, and in my younger days I often saw my fellow-passengers go to the man at the wheel and by signs or the word " Mecca," ask the proper direction, and it struck me as strange that they never seemed to consi- der that the sailor, whom they believed to be an infidel, might ruin the effect of their prayers by directing them to the wrong quarter ! The Irish Church have carefully guarded against the use either of altars or sham altars, and against lights in the daytime. The Canons printed in their new Prayer Book (Dublin, 1878) declare that " The Communion Table shall be a moveable table of wood," and also " There shall not be any lamps or candles on the Communion Table, or in any other part of the church, during, etc., except where they are necessary for the purpose of giving light." Lights on the altar were unknown to the early Chris- tians, and the practice was ridiculed by Lactantius, who died in 330 ; but it crept gradually into the Church, and about the year 400, we find Vigilantius attacking the lighting of candles at the tombs of the saints in the day- time as a pagan superstition. We are told in the Apocryphal Book of Baruch that the Babylonians lighted up candles to their gods. " They light them candles, yea, more than for them- selves, whereof they cannot see one." This was neither more nor less than the worship of Tammuz, the human representative of the Sun, the great Fire-god, and Tam- muz moreover was identical with Zoroaster, as is shown by the Rev. Mr. Hislop. (" The Two Babylons," London, 1871). Tammuz or Thammuz, i. e., the perfecting fire, or fire the perfector, was also known by other names and titles, I H H -N ;-:j. •,-4-i'- 1 ;'Wiswwew»«"rv.n, »^.»»'i' Photomount Lights on the Altar. 33 I ise the She- earth now nedans turn [ often saw leel and by rection, and ed to consi- B an infidel, cting them against the it lights in ok (Dublin, shall be a hall not be e, or in any where they larly Chris- antius, who Church, and acking the in the day- Jaruch that )heir gods, for them- vas neither bhe human , and Tam- -s is shown 3," London, fire, or fire and titles, as Shamash, Shems (and he is worshipped to this day in Asia Minor as Sheiek Shems), Nimrod, Dionysus, Mithra, Osiris, Bacchus, Adonis* (from Adon, Lord), Odin, Woden (whence our Wodenesdaeg or Wednesday), and in Mexico as Wodan, Baal or Bel (Lord), and other appellations. As a preserver he was called Baal-Chon ; as a destroyer Baal-Moloch ; as presiding over the decomposition of those destroyed beings whence new life was again to spring Baal-Zebub, or the Lord of the fiy, and it also signifies the restless Lord. Worshipped at Tyre he became Baal- Tsur ; at Sidon, Baal-Sidon ; at Tarsus, Baal-Tars. The Phoenicians adored him as Baal-Samen, Lord of Heaven, and in Ireland he was worshipped under the same name Beuil-Samhan, and the night of the first of November is called in Erse Oidhche Samhna, the night of Samhan, and in Gaelic Samhuinn. In fact, this God had so many appellations that Sopho- cles called Bacchus the many-named, and the poet pro- bably only knew his classical names. Bacchus was some- times represented with a head-band of crosses. * Jerome who lived in Palestine when the rites of Tanxmuz were still ob- served, in his Commentary on Ezckiel expres.^ly ideutitierf Tammuz and Adonis. C -^J«'i « I 84 Lights on the Altar. ii/ !;:' i ^ 111), • t jii. "III, ■'4 ,:' In Scotland, May-day is called Beltane, or Baal's fire, and in the Isle of Man Boaldyn, and there is a Gaelic pro- verb, " Eadar da theine Beil " — between the two fires of Baal. In Ireland, May-day is called Lla Beuil-tinne, the the day of Baal's fire, and the rent due on that day is * styled Cios-na-Beuil-tinne, the rent of Baal's fire. In Brittany, a Roman Catholic priest is called Belek, servant of Bel. Numerous local names in the British Isles commence with Bal, and although in most cases this may signify a town or dwelling, still when there are Druidical remains in the neighbourhood many of them must be derived from Baal. Baltimore, for instance, is evidently " Baal-ti-mor," the Great House of Baal. m . I i > * Tammuz was also worshipped by the Kelto Britons as Gran, Graine,Grein and Grian. The river Cam,in England, was formerly called Grant, Cambridge, Grantabryg and Granchester, Caer Grant, or Grauntsethe. In the West Riding of York is a place called Greenfield, where there are several Druidical remains. At Graned Tor, county Derby, are also symptoms of the same worship, and there are traces of tumuli at Greenford, co. Middlesex. The Irish Druids called the Zodiac Beach Grian, the Revolution of the Sun, and the Solstices were termed Grian stad, or the Sun's stopping places. Tory Hill, County Kilkenny, Ireland, is called in Erse, " Sleigh Grian," or the Hill of the Sun. Druidical re- mains have been found there, and an inscribed stone be- lieved to read, " Beli Duiose," and to signify Bel Dio- nusos. In the County of Leitrim there are two cromlechs, called by the comnKm people, " Leaba Dearmud is Graine" — Diarmad and Grian's beds ; and the same name is generally bestowed upon cromlechs in the north and west of Ireland. Here we have an illiterate peasantry preserving the names of two of their ancient gods for .pi # # |tl] ^w •;w %9 D A ■■^< as ;i h( sa m ■al tl C( a] n si a n ; V 'SjgjfspjrH* ■■^fW' '^ 'j>vf^*\ty^---f^ - ■ 1^ ^^r-mi -^r^i^*^ W*' Photomount Lights on the Altar. u or Baal's fire, a Gaelic pro- B two fires of uil-tinne, the I that day i.s lal's fire. In Jelek, servant 3S commence lay signify a dical remains derived from Baal-ti-mor," )0 Britons as Q,in England, mtabryg and In the West where there Tor, county ^^orship, and iiddlesex. Grian, the ivere termed Llled in Erse, )ruidical re- ed stone be- ify Bel Dio- cromlechs, id is Graine" me name is north and e peasantry nt gods for jfourteen centuries at least ; for while the names of Iplaces would be preserved in writings, the names of these fjunimportant stones have probably been handed down ^y oral tradition. Diarmad is said to have eloped with ^he wife of Finn Mac Cumhal, or Fingal as he is usually Jcalled. Her name was Graine, and the peasantry have .Connected these monuments with her, possibly because Ithey are styled beds, but the cromlechs in Holland are |also called beds or graves (Hunehedden), and in Denmark plant's Chambers. ^ But it may be asked who is Diarmad ? " The Book of |.the Dean of Lismore " (Scotland) will show. The Dean, |who died in 1551, left a MS. volume of poems, one of ; which is headed, " A houdir so Ossin," The author is 1 Ossian, wherein mention is made of this " dermit doone," $in modern Gaelic Diarmad donn ; and in a Lament for the I Death of Dermit M'O'Zwine (Diarmad Mac O'Duine), by Allan McRorie, in the same collection, occur the words, 4" Women all mourn this sad and piteous tale." i Ossian, the author of the first poem, was living as late , as A.D. 432. He says, " I have seen dermit doone," but ( he may have meant in a dream, for in another poem he says, " I saw the household of Finn. ... I saw by my side a vision." Possibly he had then outlived them ^ all. K This Diarmad was the Keltic Adonis. Like Adonis of the Greeks, and Baldur of the Scandinavians, he was celebrated for his beauty.* Apollo was golden-haired, and Diarmad had long yellow locks ; like Adonis, Diar- , mad was a huntsman, like him and Tammuz, he was slain by a wild boar (and in the case of both Diarmad and Tammuz it was accidental), like Adonis and Tam- muz, all the women wept for him, and all the world wept for Baldur, and while the demi-god Achilles was * Diarmad had a ball-seirce, or beauty-spot, which no woman c juld resist, and Baldur was so fair that light was said to emanate from him. 36 Lights on the Altar. 'j( ■ « ■ invulnerable except in his heel, Diarmad was invulnerable except in the sole of his foot, and Baldur was invulner- able against everything — weapons, diseases, poisons, wild beasts — the mistletoe only excepted, and he was killed by a twig of mistletoe, or a magic spear made of the mistletoe. Like Achilles, Diarmad was also a victim of jealousy. According to the Irish legend of the elopement of Diarmad and Graine, the fugitives escaped for a year and a day, during which time they never slept in the same bed for more than one night. Hence they say there are 366 of these beds in Ireland ; an evident allusion to the revolution of the Sun, and to the Sun-god. This Keltic Adonis is the fabled ancestor of the Clan Cambel, or Campbell, who have been known in the High- lands for ages as Siol or Clann Diarmaid, the race, tribe, or children of Diarmad, and also as Siol or Clann O'Duine, the Clan O'Duine. They are said in some tradi- tions to have derived their name Cambel from the grace- fully curved or arched mouth (cam-heul) of their great and beautiful ancestor,* and it was anciently spelt Cam- bel, appearing first in a charter of the year 1266, and among the signers of Ragman Roll, before the year 1297, are seven Cambels, all men of rank. According to tradition they were lords or petty kings of Lochow, in the reign of Fergus the Second, who died A.D. 420. This period was about the most important of the Irish immigration, although the first arrival of the Irish Gael in Argyle is said to have taken place in 258. The prefix 0', signifying grandson or descendant, is * Cam signifies'curved, bent, crooked, and Cambel is generally defined Wry- mouth. A tribe descended from the Stewarts of Garth are called Cam- achas, from a bend or deformity in his leg, by which their ancestor was dis- tinguished from others of his name. In Lowland Scotch they are called Cruickshank, but their Clan name is Stuart. The " Campo Bello " tale is a fiction of the Senachies, concocted at a time when they prided themselves upon finding Norman origins for all the great families. Diarmad, however, is a hero of history and mythology both, and it is not always clear where to draw the line. ■i 1 ,:i In ■i !!« : Ui\ ..-""*»•«*'•>■- ^,r-«i ■9r%%^r% Photomount '■«' Lights on the Altar. 37 IS invulnerable was invulner- I, poisons, wild he was killed made of the so a victim of the elopement >ed for a year jpt in the same ' say there are llusion to the or of the Clan I in the High- :he race, tribe, iol or Clann in some tradi- om the grace- )f their great ly spelt Cam- ar 1266, and he year 1297, >r petty kings nd, who died important of irrival of the lace in 258. escendant, is ally defined Wry- are called Cam- ancestor was dis- 1 they are called 8, concocted at a jrigins for all the and mythology peculiar to Ireland, while Mac, or son, is common to both countries. The two combined is, however, uncommon. in McRorie's poem of only fifty-two lines, dermit is also written yermit and zermit, and M * O ' Zwyne occurs also us M'Ozwnn, M'ozunn, Makozunn, M'ezoynn, M'ezwnn, and V'ezwn.* In Fingal, as translated by Macpherson, he is called Dermid of the dark brown hair, but in his case the " donn" probably signified dark complexioned, for McRorie calls fiim yellow haired, and I think there are no less than ihree places in Scotland where he is said to have died by A wound in his foot from the bristle of a wild boar, while Tammuz was killed bj'' the tusk of a boar. i| According to an ancient bard, Fingal's banner had in- Iscribed upon it " Dealhh Ghreine," the image of the Sun. Logan says, " This was much respected as the King's en- sign, but the flag of Diarmad, who led the right v* ing of the army, seems to have been superior." This flag, the i same bard calls the " Lia Luinneach." It Vv . lid be a subject full of interest, could we ascertain i how long the clan have borne the two names of Children ? of Diarmad or Adonis, and Cambel. As a tribe they may I have been in existence long prior to these dates, and the I tradition that they came from Ireland is undoubtedly a t true one. A leader of the Gauls, B.C. 279, was named Cambaul (Cambaules). Could that have been even then ; a clan name ? It is not a very wild suggestion to hint at such a source, for there must have been considerable , intercourse between Ireland and Gaul, as so intimate were the relations between England and the mainland, that ; Caesar, 56 years before our Saviour's birth, tells us the V Gauls were accustomed to send their children to England ^ for their education, and Tacitus says that the language of the Gauls and Britons was identical. * There are many interchangeable letters in the Keltic tongues. We our- i- selves say Willy or Billy, Polly or Molly. '::4* -^:*t»i|)^^ •f ' • i m '?\ i "till "% L'*' ^!*> ■4 { i ' ■■ ".'■l \ S' .. 1 / , i 38 Lights on the Altar. The bards have evidently confounded the god Diarmad with the mortal, as the tale of the death from the wound in the foot plainly belongs to the era of mythology. As a family or clan name it probably arose from a Druid, who adopted the name of the deity he served, or from a hero who took the name of his favourite god. Such was not an unusual custom. At Delphi, the priest who represented Bacchus was himself called by that name. The priest of Cnuphis, in Egypt, was called Se- cnuphis, the priestess of Delphi was called Pythia, from Python, and the Druid of the god Hu, whose symbol was an adder, was called Adder. In Scandinavia about B.C. 70, the hero Sigge, son of Fridulph, assumed the name of Odin, the supreme god of the Teutonic nations, and from this so-called historical Odin, the kings of Norway and Denmark, and the Anglo-Saxon kings derived their de- scent. ' ^ ' I. ' : : ^ '; ' ^ If ■ , ' ! " ' ■ '' \ . \ '■■ , In Scotland, as well as in Ireland, Druidical remains abound. 1 he Grampians were anciently called Granze- bene,* Grian's hills, and there is a hill in the parish of Fortingal, County of Perth, called Grianan hill, at the foot of which is an ancient circular building, one of the stones measuring twenty-nine feet long. This was^ un- doubtedly, a temple of Grian, as the sun temples were usually of a round form. In Strathspey, County of Elgin, are some Druidical remains, called Griantach or Sliabh Grianus, the heath of the Sun, who was worshipped until the time of the Romans, for it was usual with them to add the names of foreign gods to those of their own, and an altar dedicated to the Sun divinity, Apollo Gran ( Apol- lini Granno), was found at Musselburrh. Strathspey is called the Grant country, and the clan Grant undoubtedly derive their name from the temple of the Sun-god, and it was, probably, so understood, when * From ben, a hill, the Cornish pen. Sleigh, which means a hill in Ireland, is used in Scotland to signify a heath. I 1 I .V.i L mm '•••-^¥t;,Hj^- Photomount Lights on the Altar. i. V jod Diarmad a the wound ihology. As om a Druid, ved, or from god. Such the priest ed by that IS called Se- ^ythia, from symbol was about B.C. the name of is, and from *Torway and ed their de- cal remains led Granze- he parish of hill, at the , one of the lis waSi un- mples were ty of Elgin, i or Sliabh lipped until ith them to ir own, and jrran(Apol- d the clan 3 temple of tood, when bill in Ireland, ;they adopted their crest, a burning mount, which evidently /refers to fire-worship. J In Gough's " Camden," (London, 1806) it is stated that tin the Parish of Buthil, in Strathspey, " there is a small ■Igrove of trees held in such veneration, that nobody will icut a branch out of it." ■^, This must have been originally a sacred grove con- Jnected with the neighbouring temple. y Baal was worshipped in the British Isles by fires call- led Beltan, Beltane and Belteine, which have been kept I up in some parts of England and Scotland until within I the present century. The fires on the first of May were I dedicated to Astart^, who had so many names that Tshe, as Isis, was called Myrionyma, the goddess with , " ten thousand names. " The Kelts of the Netherlands and Germany worshipped her as Ostara or Eoster. In Britain she appears to have been known as Ceredwin, but out of nearly one hundred of her names now before me I cannot determine by which she was worshipped in Scotland. As % the consort of Tammuz she was called Baalath or Beltis, I the Lady, and the Queen of Heaven and it was custom- C ary on this day, in the British Isles at least, to extinguish ; all the fires and rekindle them with the sacred fire ob- tained from the Druids. The same " Holy Fire ^' which I is still rekindled every year by the Greek priests in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem — except that in the present day the priests probably derive their " Holy Fire " from a friction match ! After the Pagan and Christian festivals were amalga- mated the British Christians continued for some time to extinguish their fires on Easter Day, and to kindle them anew with fire obtained from the Roman Catholic priests * * An old poot says : " On Easter Eve the fire all is quencht in every place, And fresh againe from out the flint is f etcht with solemne grace : The priest doth halow this against great daungersmany one, A brande whereof doth every man with greedie minde take home 40 Lights on the Altar. ■ 1 . / I % im [•'■t. •• ,! m and they still, in too many cases, continue to decorate their places of worship on that day with flowers, in the very same manner that their papjan ancestors decorated their altars to Astart^ — ignoring entirely the words of St. John, that, " God is a Spirit; and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth " — and St. Paul's, " Neither is worshipped hy men's hands as though he needeth anything." Polydore Vergil, the Pope's Legate to England in 1503, says " Trimming of the temples with hangynges, flowers, boughes, and garlondes, was taken of the heathen people, which decked their idols and houses with such array ;" and Sir Isaac Newton observes that " the Heathens were delighted with the festivals of their gods, and unwilling to pai t with those ceremonies. Therefore Gregory, Bishop of Neo-Csesarea, in Pontus (A.D. 264), to facilitate their conversion, instituted annual festivals to the saints and martyrs ; hence the keeping of Christmas with ivy, feasting, plays and sports, came in the room of the Bac- chanalia and Saturnalia; the celebration of May-day with flowers, in the room of the Floralia." No scholar will venture to deny that floral decora- tion of churches, harvest festivals and the like, were all derived from the Pagans, through the Church of Rome. Many of these customs and ceremonies which were given up after the blessed Reformation, had become obsolete and almost forgotten until revived within the last few years by the Puseyitns. Hislop's words with regard to processions will apply equally well to floral decorations of churches. " The very idea is an affront to the majesty of heaven ; it implies that that God who is a Spirit sees with the eyes of flesh. A taper great, the Paschnll namde with musicke then they blesse, And frankencense herein they pricke, for greater holiness ; This burneth night and day as sign of Christ that conquerde hell, As if so be this foolish toye suffiseth this to tell." "V mm M ipni Lights on the Altar. 41 o decorate ^ers, in the i decorated '^ords of St. >rship Him St. Paul's, though he id in 1503, es, flowers, len people, ch array ;" ;hens were unwilling ►ry, Bishop itate their saints and with ivy, »f the Bac- ^-day with l1 decora- were all of Rome, ^ere given olete and 'ew years ^ill apply The very t implies of ilesh, blesse, jheU, if4 and may be moved by the imposing picturesqueness of such a spectacle, just as sensuous mortals might." Midsummer eve (June 24) was another Druidical festi- val which was made to correspond with St. John's Day, and fires, now called St. John's fires, are still made in Ireland and Britanny. In the former country they are also called bone-fires (not bon -fires), perhaps derived from Baun, a god of night. The night of the first of November was also another fire festival, afterwards called All-hallo we ven. The fires made on that night were called in some parts of England Tindels and Tinleys, and in Ayrshire Tannels. Besides their Baal fires the Highlanders of Scotland thought it a religious duty to walk round their fields and flocks with burning matter in their right hands, a prac- tice once universal throughout the country, and in every village there was anciently a granni or gruagach* stone, upon which libations of milk were offered on days con- secrated to the Sun. In Scandinavia Tammuz was worshipped as Odin. He lived on wine like the classic Bacchus, or the Lamented One, but some of his attributes appear to have been transmitted to his sons, for the cross, as we have already seen, was peculiar to Thor. The Scandinavian Runic tyr, similar to our T, except that the limbs bend downwards, was, however, sacred to Tyr, another son of Odin, while the Runic letter Th. (somewhat resembling our P) was sacred to Thor. Odin's second son Balder (Baal-zer, the Seed of Baal), god of the summer sun, was the Lamented one of the North, for at his death everything was made to weep for him. According to the belief of the ancient Scandina- vians men, beasts, trees, metals, and the stones themselves wept for him like as when the sun causes a thaw in * This must have been another name of the Sun-god. Gruagach, signifies hairy, and Apollo's long golden locks were emblematic of the sun's rays. ■ ^ < i \ 42 Lights on the Altar. Sii. ■4 spring. Torches were lit up to his honour in the houses and Baal fires were made upon the mountains, and the people danced round them shouting and singing and passing their children and cattle through the fires, as in the British Isles, and like Baal's prophets of old and the worshippers of Moloch, Th-^' : fires, called Balderbal or Balder's fires, were held about the end of January, and were accompanied by feasting. On the introduction of Christianity they were replaced by the feast of Candlemas ! Balder 's fires were also made on Midsummer eve, and probably also in May and N^vcnbcr. In GeTTnf,:.ny fires were formerly made on the eve of the first of ilitv, called Walpurgis nacht. The Rgyptiaris on a certain night in the year as we letvrn fr j.n Hororl ''.;«, burned lamps in the open air in honour of Osiris, and ■ ■• Pagan Rome, as Augustine tells us, the temple of Vesta where the " Eternal Fire " was kept, was the most sacred and most reverenced of all the temples of Rome. The perpetual fire was maintained by virgins called Vestal Virgins. In Scandinavia there were also suf^.h virgins, priestesses of Freyja, whose duty it was to watch the sacred fire, and in Peru, during the reign of the Incas, there were virgins of the sun or the elect as they were called, whose duty it also was to watch the sacred fire. Prescott (" Conquest of Peru ") was astonished to find so close a resemblance between the institutions of the American Indian, the ancient Roman and the modern Roman Catholic, but does not account for it. The key, however, is to be found in Jeremiah (li. 57) " Babylon hath been a golden cup in the Lord's hand, that hath made ALL THE EARTH drunken." The Guebres of Persia, called in India Parsees, still worship the Sun and have at Yezd (called by them the Seat of Religion) in Persia, a Fire-Temple which they assert had has the sacred fire in it since the days of Zoro- ir^mm mi Lights on the Altar. 43 aster, and Layard describes the worship of Scheick Shems by the Yezidis, of Koordistan, who once a year celebrate the festival of burning lamps to his honour, r.