104 ON THE ORIGIN OF CREMATION, 
life. Others again, he says, understood the one rite as refer- 
ring to Puarrton, and the other to the flood of Deucatron. 
Sunt quia Phaéthonta referri 
Credant, et nimias Deucalionis aquas. 
Ibid. v. 793. 
Pieris, in his Heroglyphica, quotes the language of PLav- 
tus, as affording a “a that the ancient apie ascribed a 
purifying virtue to fire. 
Quid impurate, quanquam Volcano studes, 
Coenz ne causa, aut mercedis gratia, 
Nos nostras edes postulas comburere ? 
Aulular. ap Pier, fol. 343. E. 
Priertus, however, remarks, that they made a distinction be- 
tween the use of fire and water, viewing the one as the means 
of purification, the other of expiation. Ignis autem, ut nostri 
veteres tradidere, purgat ; aqua expiat, lustratque. 
As both these modes of purification were practised long be- 
fore the Romans had a national existence, it is not surprising 
that the ritual poet found himself quite at a loss to account for 
their origin. Though I do not pretend to determine from 
whom the Romans received these rites; yet the analogy, not 
only in the use, but in the conjunction of these, with that ordi- 
nance given to the Hebrews, with respect to the spoils taken 
in war, is too striking to be passed over in silence: “ The gold 
“ and the silver, the brass, the iron, the tin and the lead, eve- 
“ ry thing that may abide the fire, ye shall make it go through 
“ the fire, and it shall be clean ; nevertheless, it shall be puri- 
“* fied with the water of separation: and all that abideth not 
“the 
