subject, the exterior appearance of some of those relics might have revealed the extravagance and absurdity of the mistake. The variety of their form might have precluded it; at Juganaut, for instance, the pillar of black stone, which is fifty cubits in height, is of an octagonal figure.' At Chunar, there is a large slab of black marble, on which the Hindoos believe that the Almighty is seated personally, though invisibly, for nine hours every day, and for the other three he removes to Benares.2 Now at Benares there is a pillar forty feet in height, which even the Hindoos do not degrade with the usual designation; for they call it Siva's walking staff, and hold it in high veneration: they have a tradition, that it is gradually sinking into the ground; that it has been twice its present height, and that when its summit shall be levelled with the earth, the religion of Brahma is to have an end. Which tradition I interpret thus: - the religion of Brahma, which was in its origin essentially Arkite, before it was overloaded with the refinements and follies of the Brahmins will have an end, when that monument shall disappear, which is supposed to be coeval with the commencement of the postdiluvian æra, and represents the rock on which Siva reposed after the Deluge. In this respect, it coincides with the club of Hercules, on which he often leans or rests 4, and

3

1 Ayeen Akberry, ii. 25.

3 Ibid. i. 430.

2 Heber's Letters, i. 408.

4 Hercules, dum stat, eidem clave nititur, vel fessus laborum magnitudine super eam quiescit.— Museum Florentinum, tom. i. pp. 80, 81. tab. 36. 38.

the ancient artists seem to have taken pains to show, that it symbolised something more than a club, by the vast dimensions they have given it, and in one gem more particularly four genii are toiling to lift up the mighty cone.

HERTHA. IN INDIA, JAPAN, EMESA, BABYLONIA, TAURIC СААВА. SOLOMON'S PILLARS.

CHERSONESE.

VENUS.

EXPLANATION OF THE

TYRIAN HERCULES AND AS

BUT monuments of the same sort as those ascribed to Siva, were actually worshipped at Rome under a name which at least has a very probable affinity with one of his titles. Terminus, whose image was nothing but an upright stone, was one of the most ancient gods of that city, and his worship is said to have been introduced there after the expulsion of Saturn, but before the reign of Jupiter; for an old poet tells us, that he refused to surrender, even to Jove himself, the place which he occupied upon the Tarpeian Rock', where Numa consecrated to him a sanctuary; that is to say, the Arkites would not consent entirely to abandon the rites to which they were attached, but compromised with the worshippers of images, by offering sacrifices to an unwrought stone. Hence the stones which were set up to mark the boundaries of lands were called Termini; and certainly there could not be a more suitable emblem of social justice in the decision of

Jovi ipsi regi noluit concedere. Apud Aul. Gell. lib. xii. c. 6. Livy makes Camillus say, that it was a very great joy to their ancestors, that Terminus would not suffer himself to be removed, lib. v. c. 54.

disputed claims, if his eastern etymology be allowed agreeably to his eastern origin. Yama, or Ham, who usurped from his father the titles of Pitripeti, Lord of the Patriarchs, and Mritu or Death (for he, who witnessed, and was supposed by some to have caused, the destruction of the world, was on that account called Death, or the destroying power), also, took to himself the oblations of water, which were offered in honour of deceased ancestors', and the name of Dherma Rajah, or the Lord of Justice. To this title Terminus is an exact equivalent, being Dherma Menu, the Menu or God of Justice. One form of monument, consecrated to this deity for the purpose of marking boundaries, was the Kistvaen, which, like all other sacred places, was sometimes used for interment : but then it had an arched roof over it, which would give it the appearance of an inverted Bari. There was another sacred stone at Rome brought from Pessinus at the confluence of the Gallus and Sangarius, and always taken in a waggon and inclosed in silver2, on the 26th of March, to the confluence of the Tyber and the Almo, and there dipped into the stream with great solemnity. But this was the image of the mother of the gods, which Barth supposes to be the earth3: and in that case the ceremony of immersion was very significant, and suitable

1 The 14th day of the dark half of the month Aswini is sacred to Yama. Bathing and libations are auspicious on that day. Moor's Hind. Pan. p. 303. and 305.

2

Lapis nigellus evehendus essedo
Muliebris oris clausus argento sedet.

3 Hertha, p.

148.

Prudent. Persistephanon, x. 155.

to Arkite people. The image of Hertha, or Herthus (in Hebrew Erts, in German Erde, in English Earth), who was held in the highest veneration by some of the northern tribes of Germany, and among the rest by our ancestors the Angles, was probably something of the same sort. Its unattractive form was indeed guarded from the public gaze with such jealous care, that the poor slaves, who had the ill luck to officiate in her mysteries, were immediately drowned, that they might not reveal the secret. But the ceremonies were much the same she was carried from her sanctuary in a sacred island on a waggon drawn by cows, and bathed in a lake.' The island is supposed to have been Heligoland, or Holy Island, which was also called Fosetiland, or Fostan2; that is, the land of Fo, or Buddha, who has left other traces of himself among the Germans in the grove of Baduhenna3, which is supposed to be the modern Holt Pade in Sevenwolden, one of three districts in Friesland. It is true that the immersion of Hertha bears a nearer resemblance to the Brahminical immersion of Durga in the Ganges, than to any rite now belonging to Buddha; but since the Buddhists are a far more ancient sect, though their doctrine is not much less corrupted by a false philosophy, if there be any thing in their creed sufficient to account for the religious veneration of 1 Tacitus de Mor. German. c. 40.

2 Barth says, that Foseti was called Fostan; but that is surely a mistake: Fostan is, like Hindostan, the name of the country, not of the person.

3 Tacit. Annal. iv. 73. Cena, Hena das Weib.

Henn soll in Keltischen alt heissen Burth's Hertha, p. 42.