they represented the rape and descent of Proserpine, spoken of by Clemens, or the descent of Eneas, so agreeably narrated by Virgil, or other similar fables. The descent of Æneas may be supposed to have had a partial reference to the mysteries, notwithstanding the argument of Gibbon, that Virgil could not have been initiated at Eleusis, previous to his writing the sixth book of the Æneid; for it is even probable that Virgil might have viewed such exhibitions nearer home, in the mysteries of Nola and Apulia, which, certain passages in his poem would nevertheless induce us to believe, he had considerably disguised. That such partial reference was deemed no breach of the secrecy enjoined, we may collect from the comedy of the Frogs, wherein Aristophanes has delivered a hymn of the Initiated in direct allusion to the mysteries. The two poets have equally described a descent to Hades; but the Roman, after conducting his hero thither, has taken the remainder of his scenery, not from the mysteries, but from various mythologists; the Athenian, after bringing the characters of his drama to the same point, has thrown the remainder of his subject into burlesque, but not without allusion to that banquet, which formed, as I apprehend, the ultimate object of the mysteries. What I have to offer, is a series of a few transparencies, which will follow in tolerable regularity of succession. I have, indeed, been under the necessity of resorting to sculpture to supply the deficiencies of painting; but this liberty will, I trust, be conceded to me, when the nature of the intaglio is considered; for this, when executed in cornelian, sardine, or other diaphanous stones, is actually a solar transparency; such, as when worn on the finger of a Greek who had been initiated, would have recalled in a very pleasing way, those awful but ravishing spectacles, of which it furnished an imitation, both elegant and portable. Thus prepared for the undertaking, and having adapted my scenes, although it may be no very desirable employment to H engage as mechanist of a theatre; yet since the Greeks deigned to receive the mysterious doctrines of their religion from pantomimic representations; and since men of erudition have, in later times, condescended to direct their researches to ascertaining the nature of them, I may doubtless be permitted to proceed; and, as the different illumined paintings pass before the reader's eye, to take upon myself, as far as may be allowable for the immediate purpose, the office of hierophant or expositor:- Kai yw Tonow ποιήσω Ιεροφάντην. |