In the Country, now called New Spain, the old Inhabitants would neither eat nor drink, till they had cast towards the Sun, some part of their Food; nor would they smell a Flower, without throwing up in the Air some Leaves of it, thereby acknowledging the Gods to be their great Benefactors: Tho’ this be ridiculous, yet having an Air of religious Gratitude, it is commendable. Among other Idols ador’d at Mexico, they had one called Vitziliputzli, placed in an azure colour’d Chair, with Serpent’s Heads at each Corner.
Yea the Pagans, to authorize their own Crimes, and justify their vicious Lives, have constituted licentious, drunken, vicious Gods, &c. Instances of this kind we have in their religious Institutions, as the Saturnalia of the Romans, which were Feasts sacred to the God Saturn: This Feast was observed in December, at first kept for one day, then for three days, and afterwards for seven days. So sacred was this Festival, that while it lasted, no Criminals were to be executed, no War to begin.... And yet at the same time, a Sanction was given to universal Debauchery; all Rules of Virtue and common Decency were intirely banished, and all things run into a wild Scene of Distraction and Lewdness, and all this under the Umbrage of doing Honour to their Gods[[441]].
[441]. Uno die ... trium dierum ... septem dierum ... Bellum fumere nefas habitum——Macrobii opera, Londini, A. D. 1694. p. 155, 160, 168.
The same Game was acted in the Lupercalian Feasts, instituted in honour of the God Pan (under the shape of a Goat) whose Priests, on the Morning of the Feast, ran naked thro’ the Streets, striking the married Women they met, on the Hands and Belly with Straps cut out of Goats Skins, which was held an Omen, promising Fruitfulness, and happy Deliveries.
I shall only add the Bacchanalian Feasts, celebrated in honour of Bacchus, the God of Wine, and Master of the Revels; sometimes called Orgia[[442]], from a Greek Word that signifies Anger and Rage, because in the Celebration of it, People acted in so raging and furious a manner, as if they had been absolutely distracted. These religious Feasts were not only encumber’d with a great number of Ceremonies, but attended with most notorious Dissoluteness; for Men and Women met at them, all naked, except their Heads and Hips, that were shaded with Vine Leaves.
[442]. Οργη
The Women, who were installed Priestesses, during this Feast, ran thro’ the Streets, and other Places, cover’d with Tyger’s Skins, Scepters in one Hand, and Torches in the other, howling and roaring out the Praise of Bacchus, with Hair dishevell’d, dangling about their Shoulders. They were call’d Mœnades from their Madness, Thyades from their Rage, Bacchæ from their Intemperance.
The Poets tell us, that in the Bacchanalian Train, were a Croud of Nymphs and Naiades, a sort of Heathen Divinities; some crown’d with Ivy, their Hair loose, and intermix’d with Snakes, clothed with the Skins of Beasts, and girt about with large Serpents, and running frantick in the Woods and Mountains.
In short, their sacred Games, Festivals, and Sacrifices, were little more than drunken Banquets, nocturnal Revels, tumultuous Dancings, all wild, ridiculous and extravagant.
F I N I S.