[248] Were additional proof required that this is the true solution of the Mosaic myth, respecting the forbidden apple, it is irresistibly offered to anyone who will see that relic of Eastern idolatry, presented by Lieutenant-Colonel Ogg to the Museum of the East India Company, London, which consists of a tabular frame of white marble, furnished with a fountain, and emblematically stored with religious devices; the most extraordinary of which is a representation of the Lingam and Yoni in conjunction, around the bottom of which, in symbolical suggestion, is coiled a serpent; while the top of another Lingam, placed underneath, is embossed towards the termination, which is conical and sunny, with four heads, facing the cardinal points, and exactly corresponding with those which grace the preputial apex of the Round Tower of Devenish. Those four heads represent the four gods of the Budhist theology, who have appeared in the present world, and already obtained the perfect state of Nirwana, viz. Charchasan, Gonagon, Gaspa, and Goutama. And the entire coincidence between this Lingam and the characteristics of our Round Towers is such as to convince the most obdurate sceptics, even had I not put the question beyond dispute before, that they were uniform in design, and identical in purpose.
[249] Venus preferred a cestus, or a talisman of her own sex, as we are told in the fourteenth book of the Iliad, where it is said, that
“the Queen of Love
Obeyed the sister and the wife of Jove,
And from her fragrant breast the zone unbraced,
With various skill and high embroidery graced.
In this was every art, and every charm,
To win the wisest, and the coldest warm:
Fond love, the gentle vow, the gay desire,
The kind deceit, the still reviving fire,
Persuasive speech, and more persuasive sighs,
Silence that spoke, and eloquence of eyes.”—Homer.
[250] The offerings made at the present day are precisely of the same kind. “Boiled rice, fruits, especially the cocoa-nut, flowers, natural, and artificial, and a variety of curious figures made of paper, gold leaf, and the cuttings of the cocoa-nut kernel, are the most common” (Symes).
[251] Gen. iv. 7.
[252] Methinks I hear some wiseacre start up here and say this cannot be, because man in an uncivilised state occupies more space than when restricted by social usages. Pray, sir, who told you that man was then uncivilised? Then, in fact, it was that he may be called truly civilised, as more recent from the converse of his Creator.
[253] In fig. 1, plate 33, of Mr. Coleman’s book, “is a four-headed Linga of white marble, on a stand of the same, surrounded by Parvati, Durga, Ganes, and the Bull Nandi, in adoration. The size of the stand or tablet is about two feet square, and the whole is richly painted and gilt. On the crown of the Linga is a refulgent sun.” In fig. 2 of same “is a Panch Muckti, or five-headed Linga, of basalt, of which the fifth head rises above the other four, surmounted by the hooded snake. Each of the heads has also a snake wreathed around it, as well as around the Argha. The Bull Nandi is kneeling in adoration before the spout of the Yoni.”
[254] And Bacchus, in reality, was but another name for one of the various Budhas. Even under the name of Dionysos we find him, to this hour, amongst ourselves. “On Sliabh Grian, or the Hill of the Sun” says Tighe, “otherwise called Tory Hill, in the county Kilkenny, is a circular space, sixty-four yards in circumference, covered with stones. In this stands a very large one, and on the east side another, reared on three supporters, and containing an inscription, which in Roman letter would exhibit “Beli Dinose.”
[255] “There are in India (also) public women, called women of the idol, and the origin of this custom is this: when a woman has made a vow for the purpose of having children, if she brings into the world a pretty daughter, she carries it to Bod,—so they call the idol which they adore, and leaves it with him” (Renaudot’s Anc. Rel. p. 109).
[256] “It is generally known, that the religion of Boudhou is the religion of the people of Ceylon, but no one is acquainted with its forms and precepts” (Joinville).