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AUGURS AND ARUSPICES.

obtained the sanction of, an oracle to their enterprise individuals, who could afford the expence of the journey, and of the present which was afterward to be made to the God, observed the same ceremony: Xenophon*, one of the most enlightened of the Grecian philosophers at the time when the science and arts of Greece had reached their greatest height, applied by the advice of Socrates to the oracle of Delphi, to know how he should conduct himself respecting that expedition of the Greeks into Persia, which led to the famous "Retreat of the Ten Thousand."

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Omens were of two sorts, and there were two sorts of priests appointed to study and make authentic reports concerning them, Augurs and Aruspices the Augurs drew their predictions principally, from the heavenly meteors, thunder, lightning, comets, &c.; or secondly, from the voice and language of birds, or their flying to the right or left hand; or lastly, from the sacred chickens which were kept for that purpose, and were supposed to afford a good or an unfavourable augury, according as they ate greedily, or refused to eat, the corn which was thrown to them at certain solemn times: Cicero, the most enlightened of the Romans, was a member of the college of Augurs in Rome: and there is a whole volume in his works, written upon the science of Divination.

The Aruspices were priests who drew their supposed knowledge of future events from the observations they made upon the sacrifices at the altar; and they pronounced that the event would be prosperous or otherwise, accordingly as the ani

k Cic. De Div. i. 54.

AUGURS AND ARUSPICES.

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mal to be sacrificed made resistance, or seemed to come willingly to the altar, as the sacred fire was lighted easily, and burned with a pure and brilliant flame, or as the entrails, when the victim was opened, appeared to be in a healthful and perfect state, or the contrary1.

The substance of this chapter on the Religious Ceremonies of the Athenians, is abridged from Abbé Barthelemy, Travels of Anacharsis.

CHAP. VI.

OF THE MORE ANCIENT GODS.

Chaos, Darkness, Tellus, Tartarus, Love, Erebus, Night, Coelus, Saturn and Cybele.-Cœlus deposed by Saturn. The Golden Age.

THE most ancient of the Grecian deities is Chaos: this is not without a resemblance to what we read of in the Bible, that, before the world was reduced into the beautiful and harmonious appearance we now behold, "the earth was without form, and void, and darkness reigned over the face of the deep"."

The consort of Chaos was Darkness, and from these parents were born Tellus, or the Earth, Tartarus, or Hell, Love (or the principle of har mony and attraction by which the elements of the world are bound together), Erebus, and Night: Erebus and Night becoming husband and wife, gave birth to the Sky and the Day: all this savours of allegorical.

Coelus, or Uranus, that is Heaven, was the son and the husband of Tellus, otherwise called Terra, Titæa, and Vesta.

Coelus, and Tellus, or Titæa, were the parents of the Titans, who, as well as the Giants, their half-brothers, are frequently named in reference to their mother, the "Sons of the Earth."

Cœlus, a thing you will be apt to wonder at

m Genesis, c.i. v. 2.

SATURN AND CYBELE.

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in the most ancient of the Gods, was an unnatural father, and cruelly shut up his children in / caverns and subterraneous abodes: but it unfortunately happens in the history of the Gods of the Greek, that their actions were far from being constantly regulated by the principles of goodness and virtue.

Tellus took the part of her children the Titans, the chief of whom was Saturn: Tellus and Sa turn contrived between them that Coelus should have no more children, that he should be deprived of the kingdom, and that Saturn should succeed him the rest of the Titans consented to this arrangement upon condition that Saturn should engage never to rear any of his male offspring, and that, whenever his reign should be at an end his kingdom should devolve to his brothers: to this Saturn agreed.

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The wife of Saturn is variously called Ops, and Rhea, and Cybele, and Dindymene, and Berecynthia: she also sometimes bears the names of her mother (for she was the sister as well as the wife, of Saturn); like her, she seems likewise to be the Earth, and in this character was invoked by the appellations of Bona Dea (the Good Goddess) for her fruitfulness, Magna Mater (the Great Mother), and the Mother of the Gods.

Coelus and Tellus were never made subjects of the Grecian statuary. Saturn is represented by their sculptors under the figure of a very old man, with a long beard, and bearing a scythe in his hand, the instrument with which he gave a terrible wound to his father: his appearance is similar to that, under which you see Time painted in Gay's Fables and other common books: they may indeed be considered as the same deity, the

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THE GOLDEN AGE.

the Greek names for each differing only in a single letter; Koos being Greek for Saturn, and Xovos Χρόνος for Time. It is in the sense of Time that the circumstance in the history of Saturn has sometimes been explained, that he is the "devourer of his children."

Cybele, or Ops, the wife of Saturn, is ex. plained in the allegorical sense to signify the Earth, though this is also the signification of the name of her mother. Taking Saturn and Cybele in this sense, they may properly be husband and wife, as "Time is the producer of the fruits of the Earth." Cybele is represented in her statues as crowned with towers"; towers and cities being placed on the Earth: she has a key in her hand, to signify that in winter the Earth locks up her treasures, which she brings forth and disperses plentifully in the summer: she is placed on a chariot, and drawn by lions.

The reign of Saturn is commonly called the Golden Age, when the earth produced without labour the subsistence of its inhabitants, when all the good things of the world were enjoyed in common, when Justice, or Astræa, universally governed, and there were no differences, contentions or warfare among the people of the earth in memory of this happy period, the Romans annually celebrated a festival, called Saturnalia, on occasion of which the slaves sat at table, and were waited on by their masters, and were further allowed, as long as the festival lasted, to say whatever free or saucy thing they thought

n Virgil. Æn. vi. 786; Ov. Fasti, lib. iv. 219; lib. vi. 321. • Hesiod. Op.iii.; unde Virg. G. i. 125; Ov. M. i. 89.