242 PLAIN FACTS FOR OLD AND YOUNG 



''the pyramid of Clieops was built by the lovers of 

 the daughter of this king; and that she never would 

 have raised this monument to such a height except by 

 multiplying her prostitutions." 



Tyre and Sidon, Media, Phoenicia, Syria, and all the 

 Orient were sunk in sensuality. Fornication was made 

 a part of their worship. Women carried through the 

 streets of the cities the most obscene and revolting rep- 

 resentations. 



St. Augustine speaks of these religious debauch- 

 eries as still practiced in his day in Phoenicia. They 

 were even continued until Constantine destroyed the 

 temples in which they were practiced, in the fourth 

 century. 



Among the Greeks the same corruptions prevailed 

 in the worship of Bacchus and Phallus, which was cele- 

 brated by processions of half -nude girls "performing 

 lascivious dances with men disguised as satyrs." In. 

 fact, as X. Bourgeois says, ''Prostitution was in re- 

 pute in Greece." 



The abandonment to lust was, if possible, still more 

 complete in the times of the Roman emperors. Rome 

 astonished the universe "by the boldness of its turpi- 

 tudes, after having astonished it by the splendor of 

 its triumphs." 



If this degraded voluptuousness had been confined 

 to royalty, some respect might yet be entertained for 

 the virtue of the ancients; but the foul infection was 

 not restrained within such narrow bounds. It invaded 

 whole empires, until they fell in pieces from very rot- 

 tenness. 



Though there may be less grossness in the sensu- 

 ality of to-day, the moral turpitude of men may be even 

 greater than that of ancient times. Enlightened Chris- 



