3rd Class. Seaon-sze, or lesser sacrifices, includes the worship of the ancient patron of the healing art; innumerable spirits of deceased statesmen, eminent scholars, martyrs to virtue, &c.; the principal phenomena of nature, as the clouds, rain, wind, thunder, each of which has its presiding god; the military banners (like the Romans); the god of war; Loong-wang, the dragon-king; the gods of rain and the watery elements; and Tien-how, the queen of heaven and goddess of the weather. The Chinese also believe in good and evil genii, and in tutelar spirits presiding over families, houses, and towns.[13]
In Africa, the mythology of its different nations is based on natural objects and phenomena. The natives of Ashanti and the neighbouring districts worship water, lakes, rivers, mountains, rocks and stones, leopards, panthers, wolves, crocodiles, &c., all of which are more or less powerful "fetishes;" and the Nubian worships the moon. The natives of Tahiti and the islands of the South Sea also derive their principal ideas of supernatural beings from material objects. In Mangareva, the largest of the Gambier Islands, the gods adored by the natives were principally personifications of natural objects. A god named Tea was the deity and creator of the sun, wind, and water; Rongo was the god of rain; Tairi, of thunder; Arikitenow, of the ocean; A-nghi, of storms and famine; Napitoiti, of death, &c. The Tahitan conceives also that animals, trees, stones, &c., possess souls which, like his own, after destruction will have a subsequent existence. On the vast continent of South America we find numerous traces of elemental and natural worship. The aborigines of Paraguay supplicate the sun, moon, stars, thunder, lightning, groves, &c. In the district bounded by the Orinoco, the Atabapo, the Rio Negro, and the Cassequiare, including an extent of about 8000 square miles, and scattered also over a still greater extent of this continent, are found rocks covered with colossal symbolical figures of crocodiles and tigers, household utensils, and of the sun and moon,—doubtless objects of adoration to nations of whose existence even tradition has not preserved a trace. It is also probable that the rocks thus engraved were regarded as sacred; for the Macusi Indians, inhabiting one portion of the districts where these sculptures are found, have the tradition that "the sole survivor of a general deluge repeopled the earth by changing stones into human beings."[14] The Incas of Peru—the children of the sun—built magnificent temples, and adored that luminary; and the sculptures on the walls of the colossal temples and buildings of the Aztecs, the ancient inhabitants of Mexico, as well as the remains of the pyramids of the sun and moon at Teotihuacan, teach the same lesson with regard to that extinct race. The Pueblo Indians of New Mexico still perpetuate the holy fire "by the side of which the Aztecan kept a continual watch for the return to earth of Quetzalcoatl, the god of air." In a solitary cave of the mountains is preserved the undying fire, and its dim light is seen by the hunter if, by chance, led by the chase, he passes near to this lonely temple.[15] Among the tribes which inhabit the more northerly parts of the American continent, we find also similar traces of the important influence which natural phenomena have exercised in the development of their ideas of supernatural existences.
We could not well close this sketch without allusion to the Shaman religion, which is diffused throughout the principal nations of Asiatic Russia, a great part of the Tartars, the Eins, Samoiedes, Ostiaks, Mandshurs, Burats, and Tungsees; and it is even professed among the Coriaks and Techuks, and people of the eastern islands. This system of religion is essentially founded upon the observation of natural phenomena: it teaches that the gods (Burchans) arose from the general mass of matter and spirit; and while inculcating the existence of a spiritual world, it instils the belief in the self-existence of matter.
These remarks will sufficiently show the important influence which the observation of natural phenomena has had in the development of the belief in the Supernatural of most nations; and it will fully indicate the primary reason of the correspondence of their principal mythological conceptions. A consideration of the different habits, degree of civilization, locality, &c., will also indicate the principal reason of the various modifications which the same mythological conception is found to present among different nations.
There was one Jupiter for Europe, and another for Africa; and the varied forms under which this god was worshipped, derived from the locality, habits, and other peculiarities of his worshippers, were very numerous. At Athens, the great Jupiter was the Olympian; at Rome, the Capitoline. There was the mild and the thundering Jupiter, the Jupiter Nicephorus, Opitulus, Fulminator, &c., all differing in some subordinate characters.
Ammon, of Egypt; Belus, of the Babylonians; Ibis, of the Phœnicians; Allah, of the Arabians; Beel, Baal, Beelphagor, Beelzebub, Beelzemer, &c., all possess the attributes of Jupiter, and are the same with that god.
The Buddha of India; Fohi, of the Chinese; Odin, or Woden, of the Scandinavians; and Gwydion, of the Ancient Britons, correspond with Mercury.
Vishnu, Brahma, Siva, and Krishna, the latter both of the Irish and Sanscrit, correspond with Apollo; whilst Arun, of the Irish and Hindoo superstitions, corresponds with the Aurora of the Greeks.
It is peculiarly interesting to mark in the writings of classic authors the earlier traces of a correct explanation of the causes operating in the changes observed in nature, and their influence in modifying the mythological ideas of the period. Socrates penetrated so far in the interpretation of certain physical phenomena as to discover that they might be explained without having recourse to the idea of supernatural agency. This is most interestingly shown in Aristophanes' comedy of "The Clouds" (B.C. 440). In this comedy, written for the purpose of throwing ridicule and contempt on the sophistical philosophy of Socrates, Strepsiades, an aged and ignorant man, is represented as suffering from the excesses and expenses of his son Phidippides. He conceives the idea of studying logic, in order, by mere subtle reasoning, to overcome and cheat his creditors. He enrols himself as a pupil of Socrates, and in Act I, Scene 2, the following scene occurs:—