1825.] 
For the Monthly Magazine. 
Cave of the Nympus. 
T will be unnecessary to detain the 
reader with proofs that the “ Hie- 
ron Antron” or “ Oracular cavern- 
Shrine,” was the earliest temple for the 
celebration of religious rites and wor- 
ship. This has been ably and volumi- 
nously proved. That the “ Cave or 
THE Nymrpus” was a Hieron Antron, 
cannot be disputed, since Homer distin- 
arene it by that title. The Great 
ard’s description of it is as follows: 
“ A cave delightful, obscure and sacred 
to the nymphs who are called Naiads. 
Within are bowls (crateres) and am- 
phore of stone; and there the bees 
make honey. Moreover, there are 
within long beams of stone; and on 
these the nymphs weave purple gar- 
ments wonderful to behold. And within 
are waters perpetually flowing: and the 
gates are two; one to the north, per- 
meable to men; the other, more sacred, 
directed towards the south: neither do 
mortals, at any time, pass that way ; for 
it is the way of the immortals. Hither 
they urge the ship.’””— Odyssey, Book 13. 
In order to render the inference to 
be drawn from this account more guard- 
ed and complete, it is proper to add 
that the ship, in which Ulysses is car- 
ried to the cave, is a SELF-INSTINCT 
machine: see Odyssey, Book the 8th: 
“there are neither pilots nor rudders 
to the Pheenician ships, like other ves- 
sels; but they, themselves, know the 
thoughts and intentions of men; nor 
is there in them any fear of hazard or 
destruction.” During the passage, Ulys- 
ses lies in a “sleep like death.” It is re- 
markable that with him are placed in this 
ship-formed machine, a NEW GARMENT, 
BREAD aid wine, and an Ark, or chest, 
containing presents of various kinds, 
and that he is left within the “ Antron 
Hieron” on a splendid couch (Perikal- 
tea chelon thalamoio). The ship arrives 
there at the first appearance of the 
“ MORNING star,” and in returning is 
changed into a rock, 
_ The interpretation which Porphyry, 
the Platonist, gives of these extraordi- 
nary symbols is to the following effect, 
The obscure cave represents the worLp ; 
because the latter was produced into 
light ‘and order from darkness; it is 
conseerated to the nympus, because they 
are spiritual essences united with mat- 
ter. The powts and vrvs. of living’ 
stoné are the symbols of human’bodies 
formed from clay. The ners that make 
r héney, are’the souls of men, The: 
ontTHLY Mac. No. 408, 
_The Cave of the Nymphs. 
201 
STONE BEAMS, on which the nymphs 
weave their vestments of purple, are 
the bones with their vesture of flesh 
and nerves. The rounTaINns represent 
the seas and rivers of the world; and 
the two carssare the two poles, through 
the northern of which the souls de- 
scend from, and through the southern 
ascend to, heaven. 
This illustration, which is doubtless 
well founded in the main, is in some 
respects incoherent, and in others defec- 
tive. As water was supposed to have 
preceded creation, the naiads were con- 
sidered the most antient of the divinities. 
It must be remarked that this “ Hie- 
ron Antron” is an excavation in a sa- 
ered rock, dedicated to the antient 
marine god Phorcys, and that its sum- 
mit is crowned, like the Acropolis of 
Athens, with a sacred olive tree. Now 
Phorcys or Porcus (Pi Orcus, the “ face 
of the deep”) was the same deity as the 
Egyptian Cetus, or Proteus, who presi- 
ded over the “ treasures of the deep” — 
as the Oannes of Chaldea, and the 
Muth, or Orcus of Phenicia. By his 
marriage with Cabira or Ceto, (whence 
the most antient rites of the world are 
called Cabirian) he had the three Gor- 
gons, viz., the three primitive Naiads ; 
of whom Medusa is the same as the 
Chaldean Omorca, the Egyptian Erper 
Isis, and the Pheenician Decrrro. That 
the Egyptian priesthood had a similar phi- 
losophy, is also obvious, from extant re- 
presentations in the secret oracle of the 
temple of the fowr-faced Isis, (which, per- 
haps, indicated the four Arkite females— 
worshipped as the earliest goddesses—in 
a secondary point of view)in which three 
Isises, each figure made to represent an 
animal, which the world was supposed to 
be, and each comprehended within the 
other, are exhibited, embracing in that 
strange but meaning attitude, the plane- 
tary system. From all this I conclude 
that Homer’s “ Hieron Antron” was’ 
dedicated to Phorcys, considered by 
Bryant as Noan, as the Naiaps derive 
their name from him and the Cabire, his 
wife and daughters, the most antient 
presiding divinities of water; and that 
what it contained, according to him, was’ 
really what the Titanian, or Cyclopean 
excavations, dedicated to that antique 
worship, really contained. An expla- 
nation of those symbols will, therefore, 
be an exposition of the philosophical 
_and theological arcana, taught by. the 
first Pagan hierarchy of the world. 
“ Wirnty are’ sowts and urns.—The 
bowl and the wrn, or vase, were certainly 
2D symbols 
