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SACRIFICES OF THE GREEKS. 459 
existed on the earth long before trees; trees before animals. The first men, 
therefore, sacrificed grass, sending it up to the immortals, and indeed rendering 
it itself immortal through fire, the element most like to the gods. Then after 
this, when trees began to grow, men offered up the leaves of the oak, until by 
degrees they came to offer up the first fruits of the crop,—ground corn, oil, and 
honey. At last came the lawless sacrifices, “for men slew each other,* and 
stained the altars with blood, after that they had themselves tasted blood, being 
tempted by famines and wars” (ii. 7). The whole of these opinions seem to be 
taken from Theophrastus (ii. 5, 7, 20), and, as they harmonise with the short 
statement in the “Ethics,” we may believe that they were the opinions of 
Aristotle. Porphyry seems to think that human sacrifices were anterior to 
animal sacrifices: ‘“ Men in time of famine had recourse to human flesh, but 
before partaking of it offered up a portion to the gods.” In speaking of the 
Bassari in Thrace, he says that they sacrificed human beings, and they con- 
joined with this the eating of human flesh. “Just,” says Porphyry, “as we do 
now in the case of animals; for offering up the first portions we feast on the 
rest” (ii. 8). Last of all, therefore, came the sacrifice of animals; and in Attica, 
for instance, it was by accident that, killing some animals, they tasted them. 
Most, indeed, think that it was during famine that men tasted animal flesh, and, 
having once tasted it, they presented the first portion to the god, and thus 
arose animal sacrifices (ii. 10). 
Porphyry thinks that it is the daiwoves who receive the sacrifices of animals. 
“ Falsehood is natural to them, for they wish to be gods, and the power that 
presides over them wishes to seem to be the greatest god. It is those that 
rejoice in the libation and the steam of fat, by means of which their own 
spiritual and bodily constitution is fattened. For this lives by vapours and 
incense variously through various means, and is strengthened by the steam 
from blood and flesh” (c. 42). It is to the demons that all sacrifices of blood, 
* The text here presents difficulties. It has simply, opakdvtwy Tay avOpeTwyv Kal tols Bapovs 
aiatavtwy: “Men having slain and stained the altars with blood.” I think that the context 
suggests a\AnjAous: “Men having slain each other.” Eusebius, in his “ Demonstratio Evangelica” 
(i. 10), paraphrases the passage from Porphyry, thus: “dppw 6€ mapavouias édav’vovras Tovs peta 
tadta avOpwrovs aipatat Tovs Bapodrs Cowv chayais,” p. 34; and certainly Porphyry may have 
meant simply animals, whether men or beasts, if he wrote ofaEdvtwy without any object. Perhaps I 
am too definite in saying that Porphyry places human sacrifices before animal. He certainly seems to 
do so. But he is not very precise; and he may really have not definitely put the question to himself, 
regarding human and animal sacrifices under the one category of sacrifices of living beings. 
The chapter in the “ Demonstratio Evangelica” deserves special study, because sentences taken 
from it without the context may mislead. Lasavxx, p. 255, and Nicetssacu, p. 194, have quoted 
from this chapter the words, avtl tis oiKelas Wuyfs thy dia TOY adoyav Cowy Tpoahyov Ouciav, 
Ths chav uyis avthyvya mpocKkouifovres. But they have not stated that Eusebius explains how 
the pious Greeks of the olden time objected to animal sacrifices entirely. He affirms that it was the 
Hebrews who offered up animal sacrifices, and they did this enlightened in their souls by the Divine 
Spirit. It is of them that the words quoted are spoken, with this reason assigned, pydév Kpeittov Ka 
TUYULOTEpOV THS oikelas uyns Kabcepodv ExXovTES. 
VOL. XXVII. PART IV. 6F 
