1825.] 
represents the Jewish Church in the 
wilderness, under the form of an animal, 
as the Egyptian Church appears to have 
been. And this shows the harmony of 
the Apocalyptic denunciation against 
the “ great whore” presiding, as Omo- 
rea and Isis did, over many waters; for 
certainly the figure was meant to be a 
type of the false church, the creed of 
Egypt and Babylon. The treading of 
the wine-press and the deluge of her 
blood, meant, therefore, the total de- 
struction of her reign of violence. The 
gorgons, indeed, were the three Egyp- 
tian furies, and the three furies were 
emblems of the vintage, as their names 
signify ; one meaning to gather, another 
to store in pitchers, and the third, Mes- 
haera, in reality meaning to press the 
wine. 
Thave said quite enough to shew that 
the wine-cup in the hand of Silenus, his 
drunkenness, and his garments stained 
with wine, were never intended by the 
original inventors of the personification 
to be literally taken, as was the case 
with the Greeks. 
But we-have, fortunately, one of the 
strongest proofs, that the character of 
this deity was not of the gross descrip- 
tion which it suited the Greeks to give 
him. I mean the beautiful sixth eclozue 
of Virgil. He there appears in the same 
dignified character as Shiloh _in the 
eclogue of Isaiah, and the prophecy of 
Jacob. That: Virgil derived this, the 
eclogue to Pollio, and the apotheosis 
of Daphnis, from sybilline oracles, or 
traditions then current over the whole 
eastern world, cannot be doubted. It 
would be out of my way to go into ar- 
gument upon this wide field of inquiry ; 
but it does appear to me, that the lan- 
guage of Isaiah might as well be applied 
to Marcellus as the epistle of Pollio. 
The application of the death of Daphnis 
to Julius Cesar, is equally incoherent 
and overstrained. 
It evidently describes, on the model 
of some sybilline or oriental oracle, 
the violent death of the Syrian deity, 
Adonis, Thammuz, or Atys (for they 
were allthe same person), his resur- 
rection, and ascension into heaven. 
There is nothing singular in Virgil :hav- 
ing employed the poetical eclogue in 
developing secrets, which were shut to 
the common eye and ear, and which, it 
is not improbable, that he may have 
gained from the sybilline books which 
Pollio was intrusted to revise. The 
pastoral eclogue is employed in treating 
Sixth Eclogue of Virgil. 
195 
of the same subject by the Hebrew pro- 
phets, and by Solomon, The Messiah 
is always represented as a shepherd, as 
Osiris was; and Arcadia, the country of 
shepherds and innocence, was the pro- 
perest scene which Virgil could, have 
chosen. So Crishna, the incarnate 
second person of the Hindoo Trinity, 
is represented as a shepherd, in Hindoo 
sacred poetry, and his amours with the 
shepherdesses is told in a strain not yery 
dissimilar from that of Solomon’s song, 
and with circumstances agreeing with 
those which Virgil refers to Daphnis. 
Even a Greek blunder in mythology 
could not entirely turn aside the unde- 
viating stream of ancient tradition, Thus 
Apollo, when on earth, became a shep- 
herd; and, among other amours, it was 
then that his pursuit of Daphne oc- 
curred. Every one knows that Con- 
stantine considered Apollo as a type of 
the Messiah, and dedicated his three- 
fold serpentine column to the god of 
Christianity. But, in again referring to 
Crishna, there is a remarkable tradi- 
tion respecting him which deserves men- 
tion, since it strikingly illustrates. the 
prophecy of Jacob: “ his teeth shall be 
white with milk;” for Crishna is re- 
corded as shewing his mouth after eat- 
ing milk, to some of his companions, 
who, on looking therein, discovered a 
microcosm of the whole universe. Milk 
and honey are both used in a mystical 
sense by the prophets ; and, perhaps, 
with reference to the veneration of 
Egypt for the cow and the bee, one re- 
presenting spirit, and the other matter. 
Thus the phrase “butter and honey 
shall be eat,”’ would seem on this prin- 
ciple simply to preshadow an incarna- 
nation. At all events, milk was emi- 
nently devoted to Silenus. 
Now, what is the character assigned 
by Virgil to Silenus ? 
It is one of that transcendent supe- 
riority, which, contrasted with the vul- 
gar misunderstanding as to the sylvan 
deity, has staggered the commentators. 
He describes him as a shepherd pro- 
phet, a divine philosopher, and legis- 
lator. He gives a description of the be- 
ginning of the world, not very dissimilar 
from, nor inferior to the genesis of the 
inspired Moses; and then, like the king 
of the mysteries, he shews the folly of 
the vulgar and popular creed. Indeed, it 
appears to me, a portion of Virgil’s de- 
sign of laying open the secrets and tra- 
ditions of the mysteries. That he should 
do so just at the birth of our Saviour, 
2C2 when 
