Do we seek to arrive at farther information by means of the same interrogatory process? The upright staff which the extreme female holds is explained by the Platonists and other hieroglyphical expounders, to imply life, which is synonymous with Vesta or Cybele, Psyche and Eve. The same cabbalistical process applied to the column by the side of the male, would produce the radical sar (a column) entering both, into the name Osiris and Serapis, which latter was represented by a column having a human head for its capital. Neither is it unworthy of remark that the name Atlas is derivable from Atel, column; and Atlas, as is well known, was Lord of the Hesperian Garden, and King of the Antediluvian island, which bore his name.

We come now to the second compartment, in which the figures are beautifully balanced against and contrasted with those of the first. This contains the final act of the drama, and the subject is renewed existence.

That this is implied is evident from the serpent in the act of renewing his skin, which is grasped by the central female figure; and opposed to the dying torch before described. Now in the mysteries, as a pledge of that future life to which they offered restoration, a serpent was placed in the bosom of the initiate.

It is so on the Vase!

But the gate of death was to be passed before the promised consummation. And the aspirant passed beneath a gate in the Mythratic, Chaldee, Eleusinian, and even the Druidic rites.

The passage is represented on the Vase!

In this passage the garments of the flesh were to be quitted, however reluctantly. The initiate at Eleusis put off the robes he had till then worn; the elect of Mythra did the same.

It is so depicted on the Vase!

Among the favorite tenets of the Platonists, was one which they derived from the Mysteries, and shared with the Rabbins as well as our Milton, that soul is of no sex: or rather, that before its fall it was male that subsequent to that event sexes were produced, the hateful dyad of the Pythagoreans. This was the real source of ancient, perhaps of modern superstitions celibacy.

The Spirit is represented male upon the Vase!

In the Mysteries, the way of the initiate representing a descending ghost was tottering and uncertain. An unearthly tree bearing golden leaves stood in the way of his descent. He was led along by the torch bearer, amid the hissing of snakes, reunited to his "first love," implying primitive perfection, and introduced at length to the "beati

fic vision," to the presence of the king of the Mysteries, and the ruler of the happy fields. This character is the Anchises of Virgil, the Rhadamanthus of Homer, the benevolent Dæmon Cneph of the Egyptians, and the Demiurgus of Eleusis.

On the Vase he stands guarding the way between two trees: the first perhaps a box sacred to Cybele, or a myrtle worn by the elect at Eleusis, and both emblems of immortality; the 2nd, perhaps, a fig or a vine: both emblems of man's shame and fall: and the vine being still considered as the fatal tree of knowledge, in the East. His attitude is that of a judge, having power to admit or exclude.

In all probability he represented the "Midnight Sun" of the Mysteries, which was the final object of those ancient rites: whether he be called Jupiter, or Helios, or Osiris Inferus, Bacchus, or Adonis, or Atys Nyctilicus, whether he be Muth, or Pluto, or Serapis. The character was the same, though different natious pronounced his name with a different modulation.

Those, however, who require some application of dramatis personæ more specific, are at liberty to consider the figure as Uranus, the father of Cybele Uranus, to whom indeed the title of Demiurge, King, and Beatific Vision, accurately applies.

And, indeed, the inference is obvious, that as the vase and the mystic shows represented on it are evidently connected with the worship of this Goddess, the mythological story of Cybele most probably formed the groundwork of the drama.

As this story perfectly harmonises with the premises I have laid down, I am enabled, by compressing it, to offer a point of union between myself and the most rigid lover of simplicity, leaving the application to the reader.

Cybele, says the fable, was the daughter of an ancient King and Queen of PHRYGIA; some say of Uranus and Rhea. She fell in love with a beautiful Phrygian named Atys, whom her parents disliked, and finding her resolute, caused to be slain, and his body thrown to wild beasts. Cybele searched the body, collected the parts, wept over them, went mad, and died. But a plague ravaging the country, it was commanded by the oracle that Atys should be buried with great pomp, and Cybele worshipped as a deity. Other versions say that he first deified her and became her priest. However that be, the priests extravagantly lamented, for a stated time, over his effigy, at the end of which light was brought in, and they declared with outcries of joy that "the dead was revived." Co

233

A SECOND REPLY

to the Further Remarks in the Quarterly Review, No. XXXVIII. on the New Translation of the Bible.

It was not my intention to lose any more time in polemical controversy; but at the request of several of my learned friends, I have been induced to make the following remarks in reply to a second article in the Quarterly Review, on my Translation of the Bible from the original Hebrew.

The remarks made on my Translation of the Book of Genesis, by the Quarterly Reviewer, are allowed by many of the readers of that work to be malicious and unjust; and, by real critics, to be written in the most consummate ignorance of the original.

He begins his Review of my Reply by saying, "When WE lately undertook to examine Mr. Bellamy's New Translation of the Bible, WE found not only that proofs of his utter incompetence to the task crowded upon US at every step, but that his bold pretensions of making new discoveries, as to the meaning of the plainest passages of the Bible, tended to shake the confidence of the public in the certainty of received scriptural interpretations. In consequence, WE felt OURSELVES called upon to explain, without disguise, the grounds of the opinion which WE were led to form respecting this writer and his work." This critic has here explained, more fully certainly than he intended, "the grounds of his virulent abuse of my undertaking: it "tended to shake the confidence of the public in the certainty of received scriptural interpretations!" But if these received interpretations rest upon false translations, should the version remain without improvement? Should not the Scriptures be truly translated, that both the teachers and the hearers may have an opportunity of ascertaining whether their confidence in the certainty of any of these received interpretations be founded on truth? Can any suffer loss by a vindication of the truth and purity of the Divine record? Yes, some men may, and some men will; and "in consequence they feel THEMSELVES called upon" to defend the "interpretations" which it would be VOL. XIX. NO. XXXVIII.

Cl. Jl.

Q