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emblems of this God, who is said to have appeared to Moses in a "burning bush "; to have led the Jews in their wanderings as a cloud by day and as a pillar of fire by night"; to have consumed by fire Sodom, Gomorrah, Nadab, Abihu, Korah and his followers, the fifty sent to apprehend Elijah, and to have taken Elijah in a whirlwind with "chariots of fire." This same God is said to have appeared as fire in sacrifices; Elijah says: "The God that answered by fire let him be God" (1 Kings xviii. 24); Isaiah says that he will come with fire (lxvi. 15, 16); and Paul had the same idea when he says that Jesus will come in "flaming fire," taking "vengeance on those who have known not God" (2 Thess. i. 8), the justice of which is on a par with other acts of so-called justice recorded in the Bible.

We have further examples of fetichism in the Rosetta stone, and in the reputed cures wrought by touching sacred objects, such as the hem of a garment (Matt. xiv. 36), and handkerchiefs-that of Veronica was said to have received the impress of the face of Jesus-and aprons, such objects being believed to be efficacious in exorcising evil spirits. Cauls are supposed to protect sailors. It is also seen in the Bibliomancy-apart from its fraudulent nature-of the early Christians, and in the bibliolatry (Bible worship) of the later Christians, to many of whom, in these days of scientific enlightenment, this book is so sacred that anyone questioning its chimerical and contradictory statements is regarded as in danger of supernatural vengeance, and with whom a Bible text is considered conclusive evidence to establish any antiquated and unscientific absurdity. This fetich of the Christians is still retained in our law courts for purposes of administering oaths, as the phallus was in former days.

Fetichism spread into numerous systems of organized idolatry, and developed into TOTEMISM. A Totem was a tribal fetich or object in which the spirit of an ancestor was supposed to reside. From Totemism was evolved ASTROLOGY (which must not be confused with astronomy). The twelve signs of the zodiac were totemic among the Babylonians, Egyptians, Chinese, and Jews. The guardian animal, or fetich" the tutelary genius," developed into the "presiding stars"-the "guardian demons," or angels." The stories

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of Daniel and his safety in the lions' pit, of Jonah in the stomach of the whale, and the guarding of the carcase of the old prophet (1 Kings xiii. 24) are totemic; and to feed the Totem was an act of religious worship. In Egypt the gods Anubis and Apis were totem deities, and were fed with sacred food-the former bore an animal-headed staff or rod; and the Greeks, who borrowed a great part of their religious ideas from Egypt, fed wolves with flesh at the sanctuary of the Wolf-Apollo. Trees, as well as corn, had their spirits, and it was customary to kill the spirit as a god; the corn spirit was supposed to pass into an animal, which was killed and eaten as a religious sacrament.' The rod-the symbol of power--was also totemic, and had been magical long before the time of Moses and Aaron. Moses and Jesus learned magic in Egypt in their young days, and it was there that the former familiarized himself with the use of the magical rod. The word magic is derived from the word magi-the Persian priestly caste. In Ex. (iv. 3) we are told his rod became changed into a serpent; that by its power (vii. 21) the waters of Egypt were turned into blood, and the fish died and "stank, and there was blood throughout all the land of Egypt"; and that by the same power the Red Sea was divided (xiv. 16). Aaron, by his magic rod, produced plagues of frogs, lice, and flies. Bacchus, of whom Moses or Mises was only a personification-and the mythical character of the latter is admitted by the Christian Father Justin— turned water into blood, dried up rivers, and turned water into wine and vinegar by his rod. The conversion of water into wine was a common magical feat, having its origin in the watery juice of the grape, forming by fermentation, wine, and, by further fermentation, vinegar. The name Moses was the Arabian for Bacchus, both meaning "saved from the waters." Aaron's rod budded, blossomed, and bore almonds (Num. xvii. 8). The water-finder's rod at the present day is of hazel, as was the rod of the Egyptian Thor; and prayers for wet and fine weather still remain as relics of former fetich worship. Human bones were burned to propitiate the clouds to give rain, and this ancient custom is still perpetuated by modern boys, though for amusement only, as a "bon-" or "bonefire." The rain maker-the fetich man--was a very important person among the ancients of nearly all countries.

Ancient religion was full of conjurations and divinations by magical rods, omens, incantations, spells, charms, etc., and the Bible abounds in legends in which these find places.

Throughout all animal life there is no physical impulse so overbearing as the generative, unless we except that for food. Food gives satisfaction. Rest to tired nature gives pleasure. But the power of reproduction is the acme of physical bliss. How natural, then, that this last-named impulse should, early in human development, give direction and consequence to religious fancies.

Primitive man knew nothing of anatomy and physiology, and had, therefore, no knowledge of the physiological action of erectile tissue in the human body; the virile member at the erective moment was taken possession of by a ghost or god for the time being, becoming a phallus, and possessing extraordinary powers beyond human control, after which the ghost left it again. From these primitive ideas concerning the reproductive power were evolved the various religious ideas held later by nearly every nation-Babylonians, Assyrians, Phoenicians, Egyptians, Hebrews, Hindus, Buddhists, etc., etc. And as they personified the And as they personified the powers of nature as manifested in the sun, moon, planets, fire, air, water, etc., so they personified the sexual power; and thus the worship of the human fertilizing principle, represented in the actual organs -PHALLIC WORSHIP-became a recognized custom. And in this there was nothing of an indecent or immodest nature, as such worship, or even consideration, would suggest in modern times; the phallus was no more to these ancient nations than is the crucifix to modern Christians. They used to swear and take oath by the phallus as Christians do now by the Bible, as being the most sacred thing on earth, and as representing the divine energy. Thus we find in Psalm lxxxix. 49 (literally): "O my Adonis, where are thy endearments of old, which thou swearedst for the sake of love, by the phallus, O Ammon?" This had a zodiacal reference to the violent death of Adonis, who, at the autumnal equinox, was attacked by a wild boar, which tore away the membrum virile, and rendered him impotent, until he was born again, when he acquired fresh powers, and grew in beauty and stature, ready to reunite with Venus at the vernal equinox.

"When Abram (Gen. xxiv. 2), in asking his servant to take a solemn oath, makes him lay his hand on his parts of generation (rendered in the A. V. 'under his thigh'), it was that he required as a token of his sincerity his placing his hand on the most revered part of his body, as, at the present day, a man would place his hand on his heart in order to evince his sincerity. Jacob, when dying, makes his son Joseph perform the same act." An ancient illustration is depicted, in Westropp and Wake's Ancient Symbol Worship, from which the above is quoted, of Osiris swearing by his divine power.

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The word "phallus" is of Phoenician origin, and can be traced to the Sanskrit phal= to burst forth; the Greek phallo to brandish before throwing; the German pfal= the English pole. The name of Phallu, the son of Reuben (Gen. xlvi. 9), means he splits or divides. The two sexual powers of nature were symbolized respectively by the ancient Hebrew and Greek Tau-T, represented by a cross, tree, or pole, called the " Phallus," "Ashera" (from Ashur or Assur straight, upright), "Priapos" of the Greeks, and "Linga" of the Hindus; and the oval, circle, or crescent, and sometimes by a mound, representing the " Mons Veneris" (the mound of Venus)—a name still retained in modern books of anatomy-called by the Hindus "Yoni." The Phallus or Ashera, in Assyria, was also represented as a Trinity or Three-in-One; it consisted of three separate gods-Ashur, the chief or upright; and Anu and Hea, representing the two testes, and one god." These were pictorially represented as in the diagram, which arrangement represented the Tau T reversed, and eventually the "Cross." The conjunction of the oval or unit, and the tri-une Tau, formed the "Crux Ansata" (Crux cross, Ansatus = handle), which is the symbol of life in cuneiform writing.

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three persons

ASHUR

ANU HEA

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Crux Ansata

Assur was the supreme god of the Assyrians, whose chief city, the ancient Assur, was called after their phallic god; the same with the Vedic Mahadeva, Beltis being the goddess or Yoni (Phallic). associated with him. The Hindu phallic deity, Devi, was represented standing on a pedestal, with a somewhat coarse representation of the Yoni, and holding in the left hand the

phallus. The diagram is a copy of a statuette. The phallus was generally represented by an upright stone, frequently fixed on a mound. This was represented in the Temple at Jerusalem by the circular altar of Baal-peor the god of the opening, or hymeneus virginalis, upon which stood the Ashera, and for which the Jewish women wove hangings. It was also seen in the stone which Jacob set up on end, and upon which he poured oil (Genesis xxviii. 18), after sleeping under its protective influence. It was customary to set up a stone, or " Hermes" (Hermes, or Mercury, was an ancient heathen deity, the symbol of Phallus), on the road-side, and each traveller as he passed paid his homage to the deity by either throwing a stone on the heap, or by anointing the upright stone with oil. There is scarcely a nation of antiquity which did not set up these stones, as emblems of the reproductive power of nature, and worship them. The custom is found among the ancient Druids of Britain. The Greek historian, Pausanias, says: "The Hermaic statue, which they venerate in Cyllene above other symbols, is an erect phallus on a pedestal."

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We are told in Ezekiel (xvi. 17) that the Jewish women made silver and gold phalli (translated "images of men," but ought to be phalli, or male organs). The Catholic priest little dreams that he wears a Phallic vestment at Mass, for upon his vestment is the Crux Ansata, his head passing through the oval or yoni; the Tau, or cross, falling from the chest in front. The surplice, a figment of woman's dress, was used as a Phallic or Yonijic vestment; the symbolic use in the Catholic Church, by the bishop in the act of blessing, and by the priest in the Mass, of the application of the index finger of the left hand to the tip of the thumb, leaving the remaining three fingers upright, are relics of the old Phallic symbols of the Yoni or oval, and the Trinity or three-in-one. Many of the Egyptian gods are represented with the Crux Ansata hanging from the hand, which is passed through the oval.