99) Hesiod, Works and Days.
Later, however, Pandora herself becomes the pourer forth of ills on the head of defenceless man.
CHAPTER XI. FIRE AND PHALLIC WORSHIP.
"Know, first a spirit with an active flame
Fills, feeds, and animates the mighty frame;
Runs through the watery worlds and fields of air,
The ponderous Earth and depths of Heav'n and there
Burns in the Sun and Moon, and every brilliant Star
Thus mingling in the mass, the general soul
Lives in its parts and agitates the whole."
Although earth, air, water, and the sun were long venerated as objects of worship, as containing the life principle, in process of time it is observed that fire attracted the highest regard of human beings, and on their altars the sacred flame, said to have been kindled from heaven, was kept burning uninterruptedly from year to year, and from age to age, by bands of priests "whose special duty it was to see that the sacred flame was never extinguished." The office of the vestal virgins in Rome was to preserve the holy fire. The Egyptians, and in fact all the earlier civilized nations, knew that force proceeds from the sun, hence the frequent appearance of this orb among their symbols of life. Indeed there is not a country on the globe in which, at some time, divine honors have not been paid to fire and to light.
The Hindoos, "believing fire to be the essence of all active power in Nature, kept perpetual lamps burning in the innermost recesses of their pagodas and temples, and in the sacred edifices of the Greeks and Barbarians fires were preserved for the same reason."
The festival of lamps, which was once universal throughout Egypt, still prevails in China. On the evening of the fifteenth day of the first month in the year, every person is compelled to place before his door a lantern or light, such lights differing in size and expense according to the degree of wealth or poverty of those to whom they belong. Light was the symbol of Muth (Perceptive Wisdom). Among the Persians, the Egyptians, the Mexicans, the Jews, the Etruscans, the Greeks, and the Romans, fire was venerated as the essence of the Deity; and, at the present time, in Thibet, in China, in Japan, and in portions of Africa, it still forms an important part of worship. The Hebrew writings show conclusively that not only the Jews but all the surrounding nations were fire-worshippers, and that their sacrifices were not infrequently to the God of Fire. Of this Forlong says:
"When Rome was rearing temples to the fame and worship of Fire, we find the prophets of Israel occasionally denouncing the wickedness of its worship by their own and the nations around them; nevertheless, even to Christ's time Molok always had his offerings of children."(100)
100) Rivers of Life and Faiths of Man in an Lands, vol. i., p. 325.