438 DR DONALDSON ON THE EXPIATORY AND SUBSTITUTIONARY 
“seem to:rank under the political, (for the political does not aim at a mere 
transient advantage, but one that is to continue throughout life,) where those 
who associate together offer up sacrifices and hold gatherings in connection 
with them, pay honours to the gods, and provide rest with pleasure for them- 
selves. For the ancient sacrifices and gatherings seem to have taken place after 
the ingathering of the fruits, like first fruits.”* This, we shall see afterwards, 
was also the opinion of his pupil Theophrastus ; and if we may trust Porphyry, 
it was the opinion of Empedocles, who lived a hundred years before Aristotle.t 
3. We find still the two classes of propitiatory sacrifices I have mentioned 
above. The Greeks continued to believe that the gods looked down with 
jealous eyes on the unbroken happiness or prosperity of mortals; and this 
sentiment is again and again expressed by Herodotus, and illustrated by several 
beautiful and well-known tales. The Greek of his time, therefore, felt the same 
need as the man of the Homeric period to pray and offer sacrifices to a god, that 
he might be merciful to him, even though he had committed no sin against him. 
But it is the propitiatory sacrifices offered up when sins were committed to 
which we are bound to give special attention, as they are the only sacrifices 
which can be supposed in any way to support the second theory. Now, these 
sacrifices have reference only to peculiar sins,—namely, those by which a god 
was insulted, and those which led to the death of aman. Other sins called for 
no sacrifice ; and, indeed, the first class of sins never seem to call for sacrifices 
by themselves. The god first shows his anger by a plague, and then the 
people feel that something must be done. 
In this matter considerable difficulty has arisen, from a confusion of three 
different acts which the sin entailed upon the culprit: purification, compen- 
sation, and propitiation. K. Orrriep MULLER has peculiar merit in having 
called attention to this matter.{ 
By certain acts the Greek deemed himself defiled. He was, for the time, 
cut off from religious sacrifices. These acts, as is most frequently the case, 
were often not of a sinful nature, but purely ceremonial. Such, for instance, 
were touching the dead, touching tombs, sexual intercourse; but they also 
included homicide. . 
Now, for all these a purification was necessary. This purification took 
place sometimes through water, either sea, river, or fountain ; sometimes through 
fire, sometimes sulphur, and sometimes through blood. The blood used was 
that of a pregnant sow. But in this case, though the rite was no doubt accom- 
panied with sacrifice, the animal was not a sacrifice. In all such cases where 
* Eth. Nic. vii. 9. 
+ Porphyry, “ De Abst.” ii, 21, who quotes the following line from Empedocles :— 
“Tavpwv 8 appyrowt ovots ov devero Bwp.ds.” 
+ In his Dissertations on the Eumenides of Aischylus, p. 112 of the English translation. 


