Through the wide heavens she moves serenely bright,
Queen of the gay attendants of the night:
Orb above orb in sweet confusion lies,
And with a bright disorder paints the skies.”
Many striking epithets have been given to this refulgent lamp of the night, some of which are noticed by Nichols in his Conference with a Theist. Tully asserts, that the moon was called Diana, because she made a day of the night, whilst all other stars did not make a twilight. Æschylus, a tragic poet, born at Athens 397 before the Christian era, calls her πρεσβυϛον αϛρων, the ancient, the governess, or mother of the stars. Apollinaris, bishop of Hierapolis, in Phrygia, about A.D. 171, denominates her, νυχιων βασιλεια αταρπων, the queen of the nightly paths. Tynesius, who flourished A.C. 400, styles her, ποιμην νυχιων θεων, the princess of the nocturnal gods: which is consonant to Horace’s lucidum cœli decus—syderum regina. Virgil likewise calls her, astrorum decus, the ornament of the stars. Seneca terms her, obscuri dea clara mundi, the bright goddess of the obscure world; and also clarumque cœli sydus et noctis decus, the bright star of heaven, and the grace of the night. Statius, who lived at Rome in the reign of Domitian, in his Thebais, terms her, arcanæ moderatrix Cynthia noctis, the moon the governess of silent night. “Fair as the moon,” was an ancient manner of describing beauty, and, it is said, still prevails in the East.
Among the ancients, observes Mr. Butler, the moon was an object of prime respect. By the Hebrews, she was more regarded than the sun, and they were more inclined to worship her as a deity. The new moons, or first days of every month, were observed as festivals among them, which were celebrated with sound of trumpets, entertainments, and sacrifice. The moon was the goddess of the Phœnicians, whom they worshipped under the name Ashtoreth, or Astarte. The moon is sometimes in Scripture styled, the “queen of heaven.” She is likewise styled, “the goddess of the Zidonians,” and “the abomination of the Zidonians,” as she was worshipped very much in Zidon, or Sidon, a famous city of the Phœnicians, situated upon the eastern coast of the Mediterranean. Solomon, who had many wives that were foreigners, was prevailed upon by them to introduce the worship of this goddess into Israel, and he built her a temple on the mount of Olives, which, on account of this and other idols, is called “the mount of corruption.”[125] Milton says,
“There stood
Her temple on th’ offensive mountain, built
By that uxorious king, whose heart, though large,
Beguil’d by fair idolatresses, fell,