25O ON THE GODS OF GREECE, 



temples of Bengal. To deftroy, according to the Ve~ 

 danti's of India, the Sufi's of Perfia, and many philofo- 

 phcrs of our European fchools, is only to generate and 

 reproduce in another form. Hence the God of Dejlruc- 

 tion is holden in this country to prefide over Generation; 

 as a fvmbol of which he rides on a white bull. Can we 

 doubt that the loves and feats of Jupiter Genitor, (not 

 forgetting the white bull of Europa,) and his extraordi- 

 nary title of Lapis, for which no fatisfactory reafon is 

 commonly given, have a conne&ion with the Indian Phi- 

 lofophy and Mythology ? As to the deity of Lampfacus, 

 he was originally a mere fcare-crow, and ought not to 

 have a place in any mythological fyftem ; and, in re- 

 gard to Bacchus, the God of Vintage, (between whole 

 a£h and thofe of Jupiter, we find, as Bacon obferves, a 

 wonderful affinity,) his Ithyphallick images, meafures, 

 and ceremonies, alluded probably to the fuppofed rela- 

 tion of Love and Wine; unlefs we believe them to have 

 belonged originally to Siva ; one of whofe names is 

 Varis,or Bagis, and to have been afterwards improperly 

 applied. Though, in an Effay on the Gods of India, 

 where the Brahmins are pofitively forbidden to tafte fer- 

 mented liquors, we can have little to do with Bacchus, 

 as God of Wine, who was probably no more than the 

 imaginary Prefident over the vintage in Italy, Greece, 

 and the Lower Afia; yet we muft not omit Suradevi, the 

 Goddefs of Wine, who arofe, fay the Hindus, from the 

 ocean, when it was churned with the mountain Mandar : 

 and this fable feems to indicate, that the Indians came 

 from a country in which wine was anciently made, and 

 confidered as a blefling; though the dangerous effects 

 of intemperance induced their early legiflators to pro- 

 hibit the ufe of all fpirituous liquors; and it were much 

 to be wiflied that fo wife a law had never been vio- 

 lated. 



Here may be introduced the Jupiter Marinus, or 

 Ksptune, of the Romans, as refembling Mahadeva in 



his 



