XVI. TIME, THE BASIS OF ERROR AND TRUTH. KALĂ moolămidăn sărvăn bhāvābhāvou sookhāsookhē; TIME is the root of all created beings, And uncreate; of pleasure and of pain. TIME doth create Existence. TIME destroys. Mhabar. Adiparv. TIME watches while all sleeps. Unvanquished TIME! FROM the extensive view already taken of the vast primitive families of mankind, and their ramifications in those regions to which they have already been traced, it must be evident that any partial view of local religious faith, assumed on the mere dictum of the historian of such a venerable antiquity, is entitled to little credit, unless it harmonise with the great principle of patriarchal government and teaching. As the component members of the northern colonisation have been already traced to their primæval settlements, and as those settlements have, together with their geographical definitions, produced a distinct historical result, and as that result is founded on the interpretation of the actual language of the colonists, it would be just to consider facts, so evolved, as the basis of an argumentative process, on which to found an inferential course of history. Yet, as such a process might seem to rest too much upon theoretical principles, I purpose to adhere for the present, at least, to that system of investigation which has already been attended with such beneficial results. That investigation has evolved facts which through the ordinary records of Hellenic historians would have been perfectly unattainable; for it has been already demonstrated, in the course of this work, that these writers. were totally incapacitated for obtaining any such information. It is not necessary in this place to recapitulate the numerous instances of misapprehension which have been already found to obscure the plainest historical truths. Such instances might easily be multiplied tenfold. That, however, which now presses upon the attention of the inquirer after truth, is the necessity of acquiring a series of facts, all of which must be in perfect harmony with that state of society which has been already demonstrated to have existed in Hellas at the period of primæval antiquity; an antiquity, in fact, so venerable, as to precede the formation of that language and that state of society which is usually called Grecian. Of the origin of the term Graikos, which we through the medium of the Romans have at length received as the term "Greek," I purpose giving a brief notice; the more especially as it is in intimate connexion with what is generally considered a mythological portion of Hellenic record. For the present, however, it will be necessary to review some of the most salient features in the primitive Hellenic society; for, until this be done, the accounts already received through the false medium presented by Hellenic histories, will be apt not only to bias, but to lead us astray. Whatever facilities for locomotion may be presented at the present day by improved mechanical facilities, it is very clear that it would be impossible in the existing state of civilised society to set in motion, and to find subsistence for such vast masses of men, as, in the state of primitive society, moved unobstructed, over wide tracts, attended by flocks and herds, almost innumerable,—as being the subsistence of a nation. Movements of such magnitude it is clear, would not be permitted, through the territories of a civilised power of the present day. Such a jealousy however did not subsist in primitive society. The patriarchal system had produced families which had grown into nations, who looked back upon the memory of their venerable founder, with a feeling of the deepest reverence;—that feeling amounted to adoration. The father of a nation became its god. The same effect was produced by the successful warrior, and the true or fictitious ascetic, and to this kind of worship the Lunar race was especially addicted. Although the Solar tribes first introduced into Greece the worship of the sun, yet, in process of time, both that race and that worship were entirely supplanted by the Lunar system, which will be hereafter noticed, as forming ultimately the basis of the Hellenic worship. Before, however, I enter upon the consideration of this subject, it will be well to introduce the judicious reflections of Bishop Thirlwall, which contain a just summary of two important facts recorded by Herodotus. "In the Iliad," writes the learned prelate, Agamemnon is calling on the gods to witness a solemn contract. Among those of Olympus, he names none but Jupiter; after him, he invokes the all-seeing, all-hearing sun, the rivers, the earth, and lastly the gods who punish perjured men in the realms below. "In like manner we may suppose the Pelasgians to have worshipped the invisible powers, which, according to the primitive belief of the people, animated the various forms of the sensible world. That such was in fact the oldest form of religion which prevailed among the Pelasgian tribes, is both highly probable in itself, and confirmed by the example of the ancient Persians. In this sense, therefore, we both can understand, and may accept, the statement of Herodotus. But it is not quite so easy to follow him, when he attempts to trace the steps by which this simple creed was transformed into the complicated system of the Greek mythology. He seems to distinguish two great changes which the Greek religion underwent; one produced by the introduction of foreign deities and rites, the other by the invention of native poets. His researches had, as he says, convinced him that all the names of the Greek gods had been derived from the barbarians; and the result of the information which he had gathered in Egypt was, that, with a few exceptions, they had all been transplanted from that country. Some, the Egyptian priests themselves disclaimed; but the rest had, as they asserted, been always known among them; and hence Herodotus infers that the excepted names had been invented by the Pelasgians, all but that of Poseidon, the god of the sea, which had been brought over from Africa. It seems necessary to suppose that, by the names of the gods, both Herodotus and his instructors understood their nature and attributes, and that they conceived the Egyptian appellations to have been translated into equivalent Greek words. But this testimony, or judgment of Herodotus, combined with the various traditions of oriental colonies planted in Greece, at a time when its inhabitants are supposed to have wanted the first rudiments of civilisation, with the priestly institutions of the East, the presumed antiquity of the Greek mysteries, and of esoteric doctrines transmitted by them, and coincidences observed in several features of the Greek and the Egyptian mythology, has formed the ground of a hypothesis which is still a subject of earnest controversy. It assumes that the colonies which migrated into Greece in the darkness of the old Pelasgian period, were headed by THEORY OF THE GREEK RELIGION. 237 priests, who long retained the supreme power in their new settlements. "They brought with them the faith and the wisdom. which they had inherited in their ancient seats, the knowledge of one God, the hidden spring of life and intelligence, but infinitely diversified in His attributes, functions, and emanations. These they proposed to the veneration of the ignorant multitudes, not in their naked simplicity, which would have dazzled and confounded those unenlightened minds, but through the veil of expressive symbols and ingenious fables, which were accepted by the people as literal truths, and were gradually wrought into a complicated mythological system. The sublime dogmas of the priestly religion were reserved for the chosen few, who were capable of contemplating them in their pure and simple form, and these alone understood the epithets and images which, in the poetry of the temples, conveyed the tenets of the ancient theology. When these priestly governments were everywhere forced to give way to the power of the heroic chieftains, as the priests themselves drew back into the shade, so their doctrines were more confined to the recesses of their sanctuaries, and were revealed only to those who were admitted to the rites. there celebrated in awful obscurity. Meanwhile, a new race of poets started up, and gained the ear of the people —bards, who, blending heroic legends with religious fables, the original meaning of which had been lost, introduced fresh confusion into the mythical chaos. The troubles that accompanied the Dorian invasion contributed to widen the breach between the popular and the priestly religion; the latter, however, was preserved without any material alteration in the mysteries, which continued to be the vehicles of the more enlightened faith down to the latest days of paganism." 1 1 Thirlw. Hist. Gr. vol. 1. 210. |