PLATE I.

Of the Rotation or Revolution of Nature.

The allegory conveyed in this first painting comprises the general meaning of the scenes which follow. The vicissitude of decay and reproduction, to which, according to the notions of the ancients, nature was subject in perpetual revolution, is expressed by a female figure tumbling. The order of nature is for a moment inverted: but, by an effort of the limbs, the body appears on the point of being returned to its proper attitude.

These tumblers were styled xubiστηtypes, from xubiorów, a word derived from xúc, caput, that is, in caput deferor, devolvorque, but which may also signify to turn over as a die; and xubiστaw is sometimes used in the sense of taxillis ludere, to play with dice: even dice were anciently viewed in the same mystical sense with that which is conveyed by this female tumbler.

This painting (copied from a vase, the use of which, and of the inedited monuments that follow, I have to reckon among the numerous kindnesses that endear to me the memory of Charles Townley, Esq.) may illustrate some lines of Homer, who, in his description of the Cretan dance on the shield of Achilles, introduces two tumblers into the middle of the circle, which performed their feats in cadence, whilst the young men and women danced round them:

Δοιὼ δὲ κυβιστητῆρε κατ' αὐτοὺς,
Μολπῆς ἐξάρχοντες, ἐδίνευον κατὰ μέσσους.

Iliad. E. v. 604, 605.

Should the foregoing allegory be deemed absurdly applied, I rea

dily agree in the charge; but these are the absurdities which were so severely reproved by the Fathers of the Church, such as might be expected ματαιόφρονος Ερεχθειδῶν δήμου, from the frivolous people who boasted their descent from Erectheus. It is no part of my design to restore the religion of the ancients to its original dignity; nor to defend those who formerly professed it from the injurious charge of heathenism or paganism.† Rather let its absurdities be displayed. By discovering how much was needed, we shall be sensible how much we have gained; for one of the first evidences of the truth of Christianity arises from the necessity of its healing intervention.

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“Nihil enim adversus pietatem, ac bonos mores molimur; " nam veterum superstitionum ritibus expositis, religionis Christ“ianæ veritas, ac majestas, veluti lux in tenebris magis, magisque "elucebit. ‡

PLATE II.

Bacchus, in the Form of a Vase, carried ad Inferos.

In the following scenes we shall be made further acquainted with the mythological Bacchus, in whose person were embodied the theological notions of the ancients. We shall view him, who by ancient mystagogues was termed, "the first-born of the unknown fathers," who was invested with the power of creating and destroying, himself subject to the same vicissitudes. In him we

* See the Preface to the Essay of M. Le Clerc de Septchenes, upon the Religion of the Greeks. I quote from the English edition in octavo.

+ Ibid.

vol. ii.

Adprobatio Jo. Baptista Vicecomitis in Passerii de Pict. Hetrusc. in Vasc.,

"Ignoti vis celsa patris, prima atque propago."

MARTIANUS CAPELLA, 1. ii. p. 43.