The Ancient Mysteries.

THE ANCIENT MYSTERIES .

BY MASONIC STUDENT . SO much has been said upon this subject and so much has been written , ancl so much said and so much written in ignorance and in error , that it has seemed to me Avell to bring to tbe notice of my readers one of tbe best essays on the subject IknoAVofthough notI believe \* ery much or generally knoAvn .

, , , It has boon familiar to me for many years , ancl is very lucidly ancl Avell Avritten . It was published in 1788 , by an anonymous AA'riter , translated from the French of M . le Clerc de Septcbenes , in a work entitled "Tlie Religion of the Ancient Greeks , etc . " I beg to recommend it to the perusal of all Masonic students .

0 E THE SECRET WORSHIP , OR OF THE MYSTERIES . THIS interesting part of the Ancient Religion , which in reality constitutes its essence , is at the same time that part of it which is of the most difficult investigation . Hitherto traditions , Avhich are indeed at best nncertainand often contradictory , have been our guides in endeavouring to unravel the chaos of mythology : but here all is coA'ered with thick darkness ; it is now necessary

, as it were , to descend into the bowels of the earth ; to publish what for a longtime it was not permitted to reveal ; to scrutinize a secret kept religiousl y for ages , and on which it was hardly allowed to form a conjecture . Tbe Ancients , bound by the most sacred of all oaths , explained themselves on this head AA'ith tbe greatest reserve , as often as they had occasion to speak of the Mysteries . It must be allowedhoweverthat there Avere extant a great many works

con-, , cerning those ceremonies , besides the books that treated of them professedly , ancl which , being published under the names of Orpheus , of Mnsarns , or of Eumolpns , may be turned ritual books ; it is certain , that Stesimbrotus , Menander , Hicesincs , Arignotus the Pythagoriciau , and several others , undertook to describe tbem : but IIOAV , when the Avorks of these authors are lost , the only monuments existing are some fragments that contain a fevv allusions , of

which it is very difficult to find the application ; and we are forced to have recourse to the testimony even of those that have an interest in deceiving . The first apologists of Christianity have thrown some li ght on this obscure subject . It Avas necessary for tbem to discover the dogmas that they meant to refute ; and though they have in general disfigured them , their vehement declamations contain a multitude of interesting particulars . Tbe writings of Arnobinsof Tertullianbut especiallof Clemens Alexandrimisare still the

, , y , principal sources from Avliicb tbe moderns derive their information . These , in their turn , bave been influenced by particular views . Some of them , as may naturally be imagined , have not scrupled to adopt tbe invectives that had formerly been dictated by blind zeal against the institutions of antiquity : and if there are any AVIIO bave sheAvn themselves superior to such unjust prejudices , they haA'e notahvays been able to guard against the spirit of system . In this

, respect , Warburton deserves our censure . * His inquiries are extremel y ingenious ; but he has maintained that the gods were onl y deified heroes . M . Gebelin , f who wished to find in every circumstance some reference to agriculture , perceived nothing in these Mysteries but an emblem of tbe ori gin ancl progress of that art ; Avbile , according to author of Antiquity Unveiled , !