Part 35 (1/2)
Seneca, comparing Philosophy to initiation, says that the most sacred ceremonies could be known to the adepts alone: but that many of their precepts were known even to the Profane. Such was the case with the doctrine of a future life, and a state of rewards and punishments beyond the grave. The ancient legislators clothed this doctrine in the pomp of a mysterious ceremony, in mystic words and magical representations, to impress upon the mind the truths they taught, by the strong influence of such scenic displays upon the senses and imagination.
In the same way they taught the origin of the soul, its fall to the earth past the spheres and through the elements, and its final return to the place of its origin, when, during the continuance of its union with earthly matter, the sacred fire, which formed its essence, had contracted no stains, and its brightness had not been marred by foreign particles, which, denaturalizing it, weighed it down and delayed its return. These metaphysical ideas, with difficulty comprehended by the ma.s.s of the Initiates, were represented by figures, by symbols, and by allegorical a.n.a.logies; no idea being so abstract that men do not seek to give it expression by, and translate it into, sensible images.
The attraction of Secrecy was enhanced by the difficulty of obtaining admission. Obstacles and suspense redoubled curiosity. Those who aspired to the initiation of the Sun and in the Mysteries of Mithras in Persia, underwent many trials. They commenced by easy tests and arrived by degrees at those that were most cruel, in which the life of the candidate was often endangered. Gregory n.a.z.ianzen terms them _tortures_ and mystic _punishments_. No one can be initiated, says Suidas, until after he has proven, by the most terrible trials, that he possesses a virtuous soul, exempt from the sway of every pa.s.sion, and at it were impa.s.sible. There were twelve princ.i.p.al tests; and some make the number larger.
The trials of the Eleusinian initiations were not so terrible; but they were severe; and the suspense, above all, in which the aspirant was kept for several years [the memory of which is retained in Masonry by the _ages_ of those of the different Degrees], or the interval between admission to the _inferior_ and initiation in the _great_ Mysteries, was a species of torture to the curiosity which it was desired to excite.
Thus the Egyptian Priests tried Pythagoras before admitting him to know the secrets of the sacred science. He succeeded, by his incredible patience and the courage with which he surmounted all obstacles, in obtaining admission to their society and receiving their lessons. Among the Jews, the Essenes admitted none among them, until they had pa.s.sed the tests or several Degrees.
By initiation, those who before were _fellow-citizens_ only, became _brothers_, connected by a closer bond than before, by mean of a religious fraternity, which, bringing men nearer together united them more strongly: and the weak and the poor could more readily appeal for a.s.sistance to the powerful and the wealthy, with whom religious a.s.sociation gave them a closer fellows.h.i.+p.
The Initiate was regarded as the favorite of the G.o.ds. For him alone Heaven opened its treasures. Fortunate during life, he could, by virtue and the favor of Heaven, promise himself after death an eternal felicity.
The Priests of the Island of Samothrace promised favorable winds and prosperous voyages to those who were initiated. It was promised them that the CABIRI, and Castor and Pollux, the DIOSCURI, should appear to them when the storm raged, and give them calms and smooth seas: and the Scholiast of Aristophanes says that those initiated in the Mysteries there were just men, who were privileged to escape from great evils and tempests.
The Initiate in the Mysteries of Orpheus, after he was purified, was considered as released from the empire of evil, and transferred to a condition of life which gave him the happiest hopes. ”I have emerged from evil,” he was made to say, ”and have attained good.” Those initiated in the Mysteries of Eleusis believed that the Sun blazed with a pure splendor for them alone. And, as we see in the case of Pericles, they flattered themselves that Ceres and Proserpine inspired them and gave them wisdom and counsel.
Initiation dissipated errors and banished misfortune: and after having filled the heart of man with joy during life, it gave him the most blissful hopes at the moment of death. We owe it to the G.o.ddesses of Eleusis, says Socrates, that we do not lead the wild life of the earliest men: and to them are due the flattering hopes which initiation gives us for the moment of death and for all eternity. The benefit which we reap from these august ceremonies, says Aristides, is not only present joy, a deliverance and enfranchis.e.m.e.nt from the old ills; but also the sweet hope which we have in death of pa.s.sing to a more fortunate state. And Theon says that partic.i.p.ation of the Mysteries is the finest of all things, and the source of the greatest blessings. The happiness promised there was not limited to this mortal life; but it extended beyond the grave. There a new life was to commence, during which the Initiate was to enjoy a bliss without alloy and without limit.
The Corybantes promised eternal life to the Initiates of the Mysteries of Cybele and Atys.
Apuleius represents Lucius, while still in the form of an a.s.s, as addressing his prayers to Isis, whom he speaks of as the same as Ceres, Venus, Diana, and Proserpine, and as illuminating the walls of many cities simultaneously with her feminine l.u.s.tre, and subst.i.tuting her quivering light for the bright rays of the Sun. She appears to him in his vision as a beautiful female, ”over whose divine neck her long thick hair hung in graceful ringlets.” Addressing him, she says, ”The parent of Universal nature attends thy call. The mistress of the Elements, initiative germ of generations, Supreme of Deities, Queen of departed spirits, first inhabitant of Heaven, and uniform type of all the G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses, propitiated by thy prayers, is with thee. She governs with her nod the luminous heights of the firmament, the salubrious breezes of the ocean; the silent deplorable depths of the shades below; one Sole Divinity under many forms, wors.h.i.+pped by the different nations of the Earth under many t.i.tles, and with various religious rites.”
Directing him how to proceed, at her festival, to re-obtain his human shape, she says: ”Throughout the entire course of the remainder of thy life, until the very last breath has vanished from thy lips, thou art devoted to my service.... Under my protection will thy life be happy and glorious: and when, thy days being spent, thou shalt descend to the shades below, and inhabit the Elysian fields, there also, even in the subterranean hemisphere, shalt thou pay frequent wors.h.i.+p to me, thy propitious patron: and yet further: if through sedulous obedience, religious devotion to my ministry, and inviolable chast.i.ty, thou shalt prove thyself a worthy object of divine favor, then shalt thou feel the influence of the power that I alone possess. The number of thy days shall be prolonged beyond the Ordinary decrees of fate.”
In the procession of the festival, Lucius saw the image of the G.o.ddess, on either side of which were female attendants, that, ”with ivory combs in their hands, made believe, by the motion of their arms and the twisting of their fingers, to comb and ornament the G.o.ddess' royal hair.” Afterward, clad in linen robes, came the initiated. ”The hair of the women was moistened by perfume, and enveloped in a transparent covering; but the men, terrestrial stars, as it were, of the great religion, were thoroughly shaven, and their bald heads shone exceedingly.”
Afterward came the Priests, in robes of white linen. The first bore a lamp in the form of a boat, emitting flame from an orifice in the middle: the second, a small altar: the third, a golden palm-tree: and the fourth displayed the figure of a left hand, the palm open and expanded, ”representing thereby a symbol of equity and fair-dealing, of which the left hand, as slower than the right hand, and more void of skill and craft, is therefore an appropriate emblem.”
After Lucius had, by the grace of Isis, recovered his human form, the Priest said to him, ”Calamity hath no hold on those whom our G.o.ddess hath chosen for her service, and whom her majesty hath vindicated.” And the people declared that he was fortunate to be ”thus after a manner born again, and at once betrothed to the service of the Holy Ministry.”
When he urged the Chief Priest to initiate him, he was answered that there was not a single one among the initiated, of a mind so depraved, or so bent on his own destruction, as, without receiving a special command from Isis, to dare to undertake her ministry rashly and sacrilegiously, and thereby commit an act certain to bring upon himself a dreadful injury. ”For”, continued the Chief Priest, ”the gates of the shades below, and the care of our life being in the hands of the G.o.ddess,--_the ceremony of initiation into the Mysteries is_, as it were, _to suffer death_, with the precarious chance of resuscitation.
Wherefore the G.o.ddess, in the wisdom of her Divinity, hath been accustomed to select as persons to whom the secrets of her religion can with propriety be entrusted, those who, standing as it were on the utmost limit of the course of life they have completed, _may through her Providence be in a manner born again_, and commence the career of a new existence”.
When he was finally to be initiated, he was conducted to the nearest baths, and after having bathed, the Priest first solicited forgiveness of the G.o.ds, and then sprinkled him all over with the clearest and purest water, and conducted him back to the Temple, ”where,” says Apuleius, ”after giving me some instruction, that mortal tongue is not permitted to reveal, he bade me for the succeeding ten days restrain my appet.i.te, eat no animal food, and drink no wine.”
These ten days elapsed, the Priest led him into the inmost recesses of the Sanctuary. ”And here, studious reader,” he continues, ”peradventure thou wilt be sufficiently anxious to know all that was said and done, which, were it lawful to divulge, I would tell thee; and, wert thou permitted to hear, thou shouldst know. Nevertheless, although the disclosure would affix the penalty of rash curiosity to my tongue as well as thy ears, yet will I, for fear thou shouldst be too long tormented with religious longing, and suffer the pain of protracted suspense, tell the truth notwithstanding. Listen then to what I shall relate. _I approached the abode of death; with my foot I pressed the threshold of Proserpine's Palace. I was transported through the elements, and conducted back again. At midnight I saw the bright light of the sun s.h.i.+ning. I stood in the presence of the G.o.ds, the G.o.ds of Heaven and of the Shades below; ay, stood near and wors.h.i.+pped._ And now have I told thee such things that, hearing, thou necessarily canst not understand; and being beyond the comprehension of the Profane, I can enunciate without committing a crime.”
After night had pa.s.sed, and the morning had dawned, the usual ceremonies were at an end. Then he was consecrated by twelve stoles being put upon him, clothed, crowned with palm-leaves, and exhibited to the people. The remainder of that day was celebrated as his birthday and pa.s.sed in festivities; and on the third day afterward, the same religious ceremonies were repeated, including a religious breakfast, _”followed by a final consummation of ceremonies_.”
A year afterward, he was warned to prepare for initiation into the Mysteries of ”the Great G.o.d, Supreme Parent of all the other G.o.ds, the invincible OSIRIS.” ”For,” says Apuleius, ”although there is a strict connexion between the religions of both Deities, AND EVEN THE ESSENCE OF BOTH DIVINITIES IS IDENTICAL, the ceremonies of the respective initiations are considerably different.”
Compare with this hint the following language of the prayer of Lucius, addressed to Isis; and we may judge what doctrines were taught in the Mysteries, in regard to the Deity: ”O Holy and Perpetual Preserver of the Human Race! ever ready to cherish Mortals by Thy munificence, and to afford Thy sweet maternal affection to the wretched under misfortune; Whose bounty is never at rest, neither by day nor by night, nor throughout the very minutest particle of duration; Thou who stretchest forth Thy health-bearing right hand over the land and over the sea for the protection of mankind, to disperse the storms of life, to unravel the inextricable entanglement of the web of fate, to mitigate the tempests of fortune, and restrain the malignant influences of the stars,--_the G.o.ds in Heaven adore Thee, the G.o.ds in the shades below do Thee homage, the stars obey Thee, the Divinities rejoice in Thee, the elements and the revolving seasons serve Thee!_ At Thy nod the winds breathe, clouds gather, seeds grow, buds germinate; _in obedience to Thee the Earth revolves_ AND THE SUN GIVES US LIGHT. IT IS THOU WHO GOVERNEST THE UNIVERSE AND TREADEST TARTARUS UNDER THY FEET.”
Then he was initiated into the nocturnal Mysteries of Osiris and Serapis: and afterward into those of Ceres at Rome: but of the ceremonies in these initiations, Apuleius says nothing.
Under the Archons.h.i.+p of Euclid, b.a.s.t.a.r.ds and slaves were excluded from initiation; and the same exclusion obtained against the Materialists or Epicureans who denied Providence and consequently the utility of initiation. By a natural progress, it came at length to be considered that the gates of Elysium would open only for the Initiates, whose souls had been purified and regenerated in the sanctuaries. But it was never held, on the other hand, that initiation alone sufficed. We learn from Plato, that it was also necessary for the soul to be purified from every stain: and that the purification necessary was such as gave virtue, truth, wisdom, strength, justice, and temperance.
Entrance to the Temples was forbidden to all who had committed homicide, even if it were involuntary. So it is stated by both Isocrates and Theon. Magicians and Charlatans who made trickery a trade, and impostors pretending to be possessed by evil spirits, were excluded from the sanctuaries. Every impious person and criminal was rejected; and Lampridius states that before the celebration of the Mysteries, public notice was given, that none need apply to enter but those against whom their consciences uttered no reproach, and who were certain of their own innocence.
It was required of the Initiate that his heart and hands should be free from any stain. Porphyry says that man's soul, at death, should be enfranchised from all the pa.s.sions, from hate, envy, and the others; and, in a word, _be as pure as it is required to be in the Mysteries_.