Part 61

Victima labe carens, et præstantissima forma, (Nam placuisse nocet,) vittis præsignis et auro Sistitur ante aras.

The ancient sacrifice consisted of three principal things—libation, incense, and victim; of which the latter was most important—varying according to the character of the deity to whom it was offered, and that of the persons offering. Perfection of form, as described by Ovid, was essential to acceptance at the altar.

Οἱ μὲν ὄϊν, οἱ δὲ αἶγα. So in Horace’s invitation to Phyllis to attend his banquet on Mæcenas’s natal day,

ara castis Vincta verbenis avet immolato Spargier agno.

The kid of the Celtic hunters is mentioned in the celebration of Diana’s rites by Gratius; see note 10.

Τῶν ἱερείων ἀπαρξάμενοι τῇ Ἀγροτέρᾳ. The first-fruits of the spoil were offered up to Diana Venatrix, (see c. +xxxii.+ n. 8.,) as well as the purchased sacrificial victims. We are told by Plutarch that it was customary to consecrate the horns of the stag to the goddess, and to affix them to her temple; a quiver, too, with bow and arrows, and a canis venaticus, were commonly added.

Tibi sæpè, Diana, Mænalios arcus, venatricesque pharetras Suspendit, puerile decus.

See Symmach. Epist. L. +v.+ Ep. 68. and Pitisci Lexicon Antiquitatum.

Εὐωχοῦνται αὐτοί τε καὶ οἱ κύνες.

Idcircò aeriis molimur compita lucis Spicatasque faces (sacrum) ad nemora alta Dianæ Sistimus, et solito catuli velantur honore; Ipsaque per flores medio in discrimine luci Stravêre arma, sacris et pace vacantia festâ. Tum cadus, et viridi fumantia liba feretro Præveniunt, tenerâque extrudens cornua fronte Hœdus, et ad ramos etiamnum hærentia poma, Lustralis de more sacri, quo tota juventus Lustraturque Deæ, proque anno reddit honorem. Ergo impetrato respondet multa favore Ad partes quâ poscis opem, seu vincere silvas, Seu tibi fatorum labes exire minasque Cura prior, tua magna fides tutelaque Virgo.

To the hunting jubilations of our early annals (when Dian’s revels were scarce exploded) John of Salisbury alludes in his Policraticus: “Si vero clariore prædâ, cervo fortè vel apro, venantium labor effulserit, fit plausus intolerabilis, exultant venatores, caput prædæ et solemnia quædam spolia triumphantibus præferuntur, regem Cappadocum captum credas. Sic cornicines et tibicines videas victoriæ gloriam declarare.”

Τὰς κύνας δὲ καὶ στεφανοῦσιν. The custom of crowning, or decorating with roses and garlands of ribbon, greyhounds which have distinguished themselves in the coursing field, continues, I believe, at the present day. Such were the rewards bestowed on the fleet horses of the hippodrome:

τιμὰς δὲ καὶ ὠκέες ἔλλαχον ἵπποι οἱ σφίσιν ἐξ ἱερῶν στεφανήφοροι ἦνθον ἀγώνων.

See the medal of Diana Pergæa from Montfaucon Antiq. Expliq. Tom. +i.+ p. 44. The goddess holds a spear, or hunting-pole, in her left hand, and a fillet or crown in her right hand, elevated over the head of a canis venaticus, who is wishfully looking up, as if in expectation of the reward of merit. This medal is copied by the learned Father from Beger, and derives its inscription from Perga in Pamphylia, nigh to which city, I find in Strabo, stood on an elevated site the temple of ΑΡΤΕΜΙΣ ΠΕΡΓΑΙΑ, whose rites were there annually celebrated.

Vestiges of the Celtic ceremonies of Agrotera seem to have been extant, under a peculiar modification, in London, within a period not very remote. That Dian’s worship was not confined to continental Europe, but extended, as already noticed in note 1. (sub fine) of this chapter, to the insular Britons, is an historical fact, confirmed, according to the learned and ingenious Mr. Douce, by the remains of such animals as were used in her sacrifices, and also by her own images found on rebuilding St. Paul’s Cathedral—on the site of which, Dr. Woodward very plausibly inferred, a Roman temple of the pagan goddess once stood. “It cannot be controverted,” continues the first-cited able antiquary, “that Diana was reverenced in this country long after the introduction of Christianity, when we find from the testimony of Richard Sporling, a monk of Westminster in 1450, and a diligent collector of ancient materials, that during the persecution of Diocletian the inhabitants of London sacrificed to Diana, whilst those of Thorney, now Westminster, were offering incense to Apollo. Sir W. Dugdale records that a commutation grant was made in the reign of Edward I. by Sir William Le Baud, to the dean and canons of St. Paul, of a doe in winter on the day of the Saint’s conversion, and of a fat buck in summer on that of his commemoration, to be offered at the high altar, and distributed among the canons. To this ceremony Erasmus has alluded in his book De Ratione Concionandi, when he describes the custom which the Londoners had of going in procession to St. Paul’s Cathedral with a deer’s head fixed upon a spear, accompanied with men blowing hunting-horns. Mr. Strype, likewise, in his Ecclesiastical Memorials, Vol. +iii.+ p. 378. has preserved a notice of the custom as practised in Queen Mary’s time, with this addition, that the priest of every parish in the city, arrayed in his cope, and the bishop of London in his mitre, assisted on the occasion. Camden had likewise seen it when a boy, and had heard that the canons of the Cathedral attended in their sacred vestments, wearing garlands of flowers on their heads.”

We cannot but admire the fine feelings of piety, and conscious dependence on an over-ruling Providence, which pervade the closing chapters of the Cynegeticus.

Many splendid passages might be selected from the classical writings of Greece and Rome, demonstrative of the fact that, however darkened by mythological allusions, the most enlightened heathens supported a conviction of the affairs of this lower world being under the guidance of a Supreme Intelligence, and of man himself being utterly weak and destitute when unsupported by the aid and influence of Heaven. This feeling is strongly manifested in the works of Homer, Hesiod, Pindar, Orpheus, Phocylides, and a host of others among the Greeks: and notwithstanding the mischievous attempt of the philosophy of Epicurus to eradicate from the Roman mind all sense of dependency on Heaven, (as if the Divine Essence, in relation to human conduct, “nec benè promeritis capitur, nec tangitur irâ,”) the works of Virgil, Horace, and Claudian afford splendid examples of the important truth that the natural aspirations of poetry tend to the honour of the Gods, and that when rightfully employed, the genius of man is ever directed to the advancement of religion and morality. It is unnecessary to refer to the innumerable passages illustrative of the creed of ancient philosophers, contained in their works; let it suffice that Pliny, in speaking of the unity of the Deity, gives the reason why men commonly spoke of more than one God: “Fragilis et laboriosa mortalitas in partes ista digessit, infirmitatis suæ memor; ut portionibus quisque coleret, quo maximè indigeret,” &c. The catalogue of subordinate deities, enumerated by our author as directing the affairs, destinies, and pursuits of mankind, merged with him in the belief of one Supreme Intelligence, of which these subaltern deities were the several attributes and manifestations, in the government of the universe and its constituent parts. According to Hermesianax,

Πλούτων, Περσεφόνη, Δημήτηρ, Κύπρις, Ἔρωτες, Τρίτωνες, Νηρεὺς, Τηθὺς, καὶ Κυανοχαίτης, Ἑρμῆς τ’, Ἥφαιστός τε κλυτὸς, Πὰν, Ζεύς τε, καὶ Ἥρη, Ἄρτεμις, ἠδ’ Ἑκάεργος Ἀπόλλων, εἷς θεός ἐστι:

an opinion which was general with the superior philosophers of Greece and Rome, in opposition to the polytheistic notions of their inferiors, who, while worshipping the “portiones” of Pliny, violated most grossly the unity of the Εἷς Θεὸς of philosophy;—the understandings of the former being too strong (as Sir W. Jones has remarked in the argument of his Hymn to Surya) to admit the popular belief, but their influence too weak to reform it, and establish in its place, in the public mind at large, the supreme unity of the Deity—

Qui terram inertem, qui mare temperat Ventorum, et urbes, regnaque tristia, Divosque, mortalesque turmas Imperio regit unus æquo.

For further notice of this subject, the reader is referred to Maximus Tyrius, Dissert. 17., a Greek philosopher of the second century, contemporary, I believe, with Arrian.

Οὐδὲν ἄνευ θεῶν γιγνόμενον ἀνθρώποις ἐς ἀγαθὸν ἀποτελευτᾷ. To this we may cite many parallel passages: πάντες δὲ θεῶν χατέουσ’ ἄνθρωποι, says the son of Nestor to the divine attendant of Telemachus. Hesiod begins and ends his poem of the Works and Days with inculcating piety towards the Gods; the only way to please whom and to be happy, he says, is to be religious and strictly moral—

εὖ δ’ ὄπιν ἀθανάτων μακάρων πεφυλαγμένος εἶναι.

Nor are the passages, recommendatory of due reverence of the Gods, less numerous in the lyric and tragic poets of Greece, than in her heroic poets:

ἐκ θεῶν γὰρ μαχαναὶ πᾶ- σαι βροτέαις ἀρεταῖς καὶ σοφοὶ καὶ χερσὶ βια- ταὶ περίγλωσσοί τ’ ἔφυν.

See also the sublime supplication of Hecuba in the Troades of Euripides, vs. 884.

The hymn of Cleanthes,

οὐδέ τι γίγνεται ἔργον ἐπὶ χθονὶ σοῦ δίχα, δαῖμον, οὔτε κατ’ αἰθέριον θεῖον πόλον, οὐτ’ ἐνὶ πόντῳ, κ. τ. λ.