might be preserved, they were inscribed on the leaves of trees in
characters or symbols understood only by the initiated. The
allegories beneath which these higher truths were concealed were
handed down as traditions to succeeding generations--traditions
in which history, astrology, and mythology are strangely
combined.
After long periods, through war, conquest, and the various
changes incidental to shifting environment, these traditions were
in the main forgotten. Fragments of them, however, were from
time to time gathered together, and, intermingled with later
doctrines, were used by the priests as a means of increased
self-aggrandizement and power.
It is now thought that the Iliad (Rhapsodies) of Homer is only a
number of "detached songs" which perhaps for centuries were
delivered orally, and that they contain the secret doctrines of
the priests. Porphyry says that "we ought not to doubt that
Homer has secretly represented the images of divine things under
the concealment of fable." It has been said of Plato that he
banished the poems of Homer from his imaginary republic for the
reason that the people might not be able to distinguish what is
from what is not allegorical. Hippolytus informs us that the
Simonists declared that in Helen resided the principle of
intelligence; "and thus, when all the powers were for claiming
her for themselves, sedition and war arose, during which this
chief power was manifested to nations." These songs which were
gathered together by Pisistratus and revised by Aristotle for the
use of Alexander, have generally been regarded merely as a bit of
history recounting a severe and protracted struggle between the
Greeks and Trojans.
Within the earliest historical accounts which we have of the
Egyptians, we observe that their ceremonies and symbols have
already become multitudinous, the true meaning of the latter
being concealed. The masses of the people, who had grown too
sensualized and ignorant to receive the higher divine
"mysteries," and too gross to be entrusted with their true
significance, had become idolaters.
Not only the Egyptian and Chaldean priests, but Moses and the
Jewish doctors were well versed in religious symbolism. The fact
is observed, also, that as late as medieval Christianity, the
fathers in the Church, the Christian painters, sculptors, and
architects, still employed signs and symbols to set forth their
religious doctrines. Even at the present time, many of the
emblems representing certain ideas connected with the creative
principles, and which were part and parcel of the pagan worship,
