370. Saturnalia: the Exchange of Presents on New Year’s Day.—Could our visit to Rome be prolonged across the year we should dwell on such so-called religious festivals as the Saturnalia which lasts seven days, beginning the 17th of December, when the whole city abandons itself to carnival mirth, when slaves for a brief and happy interval put on the tall pileus, the liberty cap, are allowed to be very pert to their masters, and indulge in all kinds of pranks and liberties; and when people exchange with all their friends semi-comic gifts of wax tapers and amusing little terra-cotta images, or other gifts of real value such as napkins, writing tablets, and dishes of preserved sweetmeats.[236]

More decorous is the ensuing holiday on the Kalends of January (New Year’s Day) when ceremonious official calls are paid on every magnate from the Emperor downward, and more gifts are exchanged, often of the highest value.[237] In these festivities and distributions of presents can perhaps be found the prototypes for the winter holidays of another religion and later age.

371. Multiplication of Oriental Cults.—One dare not quit the Rome of Hadrian, however, without a cursory inspection of something extremely evident since we began our explorations on plebeian Mercury Street—the foreign religions and their temples.

Very reluctantly did the grave fathers of the old Republic admit Anatolian, Syrian, and Egyptian cults into their beloved city. Even unlicensed Greek ceremonies were frowned upon and the disorderly orgiastic rites of the Eastern gods for long were extremely repulsive to the dignified builders of the Commonwealth. But as the Republic declined the foreign cults thrust themselves in and with the coming of the Empire all attempts to prohibit them practically disappeared. The most the authorities can now do is to see that these strange private worships are conducted with a certain degree of decency. Rome has never countenanced the vile revelings of the groves of Syrian Astarte, much less the horrid child-burnings of the Phœnician Moloch.

The votaries of these Eastern gods are not merely Orientals who have drifted to Rome. The new religions have a great appeal to many persons of good old Latin stock and especially to the women. The reason for this is fairly obvious: the Roman official religion is a legalistic religion devoid of the slightest spirituality. “Sin” except in the sense of reckless contract breaking, “communion with God,” “reconciliation with God,” “The Hereafter,” “Life Eternal,” and like phrases are utterly unknown to pontiff, augur, or flamen.

For intelligent persons to whom neither the Stoic nor the Epicurean guesses at the riddle of existence prove satisfying, who are torn in conscience, bowed with bereavement, or crushed by disaster, there must be some outlet better than that of scrupulously offering a black pig to Mars. Atheism can never satisfy for long,—and the Oriental religions, appealing at once to the love for the mysterious, and to the passionate desire for some supernatural explanation of the problems of humanity, as a result draw in their votaries by thousands. Some of these worshipers are utterly ignorant and credulous. Others are men and women of wealth and deep learning, who can turn the Syrian or Egyptian jargon into elegant Platonic myths, and see, behind the coarse Levantine ritual, spiritual allegories which would have astonished old Memphis or Tyre.

372. The Cult of the Deified Emperors.—The Imperial Government itself has added to this tendency to multiply cults—it created a new and a very important one, that of the “Deified Emperors.” Augustus Cæsar was far too shrewd and matter-of-fact an Italian to permit himself to be worshiped as an actual deity within his native land; but he did not discourage Orientals (accustomed to adore almost any successful monarch as a “god”) from setting up altars to him, and he took a great satisfaction in having his adoptive father Julius Cæsar officially deified at Rome, and then in accepting for himself the glories coming to the son of the “Divine Julius.”

Furthermore, even a living Emperor has his genius—his special guardian spirit, often to be half-confounded with his own personality. The worship of Augustus’s genius was soon an important part of the state religion. Oaths were taken by it; an insult to it became the vilest blasphemy. If Augustus did not become a god in his lifetime, the aura and effluence of divinity assuredly played all around him.

373. The “Divine Augustus” and His Successors.—The instant Augustus died a solemn decree of the Senate forthwith made him “Divus Augustus,” with temples, priests, and ritual—all the paraphernalia in short of a prominent member of the Pantheon. Since then in the provincial towns the priests of Augustus, Augustales, are ordinarily appointed from among the rich freedmen—men of short lineage but of great economic influence, who are delighted at the trappings and pompous honors awarded this holy office, and who become, therefore, the ardent supporters of the imperial régime.

Since 14 A.D. there have been still other gods thus enrolled by vote of the Senate—notably the “Divine Claudius” (“dragged to heaven by a hook,” people sarcastically remark, remembering Agrippina’s poisoned mushrooms), and the equally “divine” Vespasian, Titus, Nerva, and Trajan. Their temples and cults are among the most splendid and prominent in Rome. In the basilicas and in the government houses (prætoria) and magistrates’ halls all over the Empire stand the arrays of statues of these Deified Augusti along with that of the “genius” of the reigning Hadrian himself. Every litigant and every witness must cast his pinch of incense into the brazier before them and swear by their godhead.

Intelligent men, of course, understand that these Imperial “gods” somehow differ in nature from Jupiter, but the homage offered to them seems really an affirmation of loyalty to the great principles of law and order which bind the vast Empire together. Every good Emperor is entitled to expect this honor, after a worthy reign. “I think I’m becoming a god!” muttered the pragmatic Vespasian while on his death-bed. On the other hand the refusal of deification is a form of branding a tyrant’s memory; and Tiberius, Caligula, Nero, and Domitian receive no incense.[238]

The state thus teaches all its subjects how easily new deities can be introduced—apparently by very human agencies. Of the host of Oriental gods that have thrust themselves into Rome there are three or four which have won peculiar prominence; notably the cults of Cybele, Isis and Serapis, and Mithras. There is also the extremely despised sect of the Christians.

374. The Cult of Cybele, the “Great Mother.”—The cult of Cybele is the oldest and best recognized of this foreign group. Cybele is an Asiatic goddess with her most famous temple at Pessinus in Galatia. In the crisis of the Hannibalic War when public opinion was on edge, the Romans fetched an image of this “Great Mother of Pessinus” to Rome and set up a temple to her on the Palatine. The Roman matrons, henceforth, honored her with the festival of the Megalesia.

The worship of Cybele, the Great Mother, despite this naturalization, retains something about it that is grossly orgiastic and un-Italian. Everywhere over the city can be met groups of her priestesses, the Corybantes, and especially of her smooth-cheeked, squeaky-voiced eunuch priests, the Galli, executing their wild, noisy dances with drums, cymbals, and trumpets, and leaping about in suits of armor which they clash violently, while uttering screams alleged to be inspired.

In the country districts bands of these Galli are reported to drift frequently from village to village, exciting the rustics by displays of “mysteries” which are simply a gross hocus-pocus, and which often wind up in scenes of sheer depravity. Nevertheless, the cult has great attractions for the superstitious. The processions of these effeminate figures with redolent locks, painted faces, and soft womanish bearing are always able to wheedle the sesterces out of the crowd.

The coarse legends of the Great Mother are furthermore caught up by the philosophers and given a refined, metaphysical meaning, and among the priests at her temples about the city are enrolled many senators and equites, and among the priestesses a good many more of these noblemen’s wives. To be a chanter, drummer, or cymbal player at her great spectacular “orgies” has a morbid fascination—all the more because much of the cult of Cybele worship is so gross that words may not describe it. The Great Mother is, therefore, one of the most undesirable of all the gifts offered to Rome by the conquered East.

375. Cult of Isis and Associated Egyptian Gods.—Worthier and more popular with the better classes is the worship of Isis.

The Egyptian story of Isis and Osiris, of the temporary death of the latter and the sufferings of the former, a story that connected itself with the Greek myths about Demeter and Dionysus, and also those about Adonis, had become very old a thousand years before the founding of Rome. The cult was a late invader of Italy; not until the time of Sulla did it figure even as an important private superstition, and on account of the marked Oriental tendencies of the Isis worship the Senate for long discouraged it; nevertheless the stately ritual and the appeal of the mysterious made the cult extremely popular with the multitude.

In vain in 50 B.C. the consul Lucius Æmilius himself (his superstitious lictors hesitating) struck the first blow with the ax to demolish a prohibited Isis temple. Augustus had to content himself merely with forbidding the erection of such buildings within the official pomerium of Rome, but these could multiply in the suburbs, and by the time of Vespasian practically all restraints disappeared.

Everybody now frequents the shrines of Isis, and many of the noblest citizens and matrons are among her initiates. Her great temple in the Campus Martius is among the stateliest in Rome and every morning before its doors are arrayed a perfect host of votaries.

376. Ceremonies at an Isis Temple.—If we desire, it is easy to witness a large part of the ritual, although the meaning of the allegories is refused the unelect.[239] Before day-break the shaven-skulled priests, clothed in trailing robes of snow-white linen, enter the temple by a side entrance and throw back the great central doors, although a long white curtain still hangs across the interior. The multitude of the devout now stream into the temple. The curtains whisk aside, and a statue of the goddess, a majestic female sculptured somewhat in the Egyptian style, with her head crowned with a lotus flower and in her right hand a holy rattle (sistrum), is exposed to view. At her side stands her son Horus, a naked boy, holding his forefinger in his mouth, a lotus flower also upon his head, and a horn of plenty in his left hand.

The worshipers now stand or sit on the stones for a long time in silent prayer and contemplation; while the new light of the rising sun streams athwart the silent columns and draperies of the great temple. Presently a priest appears bearing a golden vessel of holy water from the Nile, and he pours it over a sacrifice of fruits and flowers upon the altar standing before the images. The worshipers all prostrate themselves in awe, then rise. The ceremony is over.

This is the ordinary side of the Isis worship but at times there lack not violent dances; processions of all manner of harlequin participants, men robed as soldiers, hunters, or gladiators, women leaping in white gauzy garments, and shaven priests bearing holy vessels—usually wrought with Egyptian hieroglyphics, and carrying especially as center of all the tumult a sacred snake, lifting its wrinkled and venomous head upon an ark of burnished gold.

The Isis worship appeals often to men of high intelligence who grow weary and disgusted at the failure of secular philosophy to solve the great problems of existence. An elaborate explanation exists for all these symbols; one might even add a spiritual meaning. It is even claimed that Isis is simply “Nature,” and that her cult is merely the worthiest expression of “the One Sole Divinity whom the whole earth venerates under a manifold form.”

To the initiates (into whose esoteric lore we cannot penetrate) is promised in this world a very fortunate life and that then “having accomplished the span of this existence, they shall descend to the realms below, and even there, dwelling as they shall in the Elysian fields, they shall frequently adore me—the goddess.”[240]

377. Cult of Serapis and of Other Oriental Gods.—The Isis worship thus has its nobler side. Not unworthy too is that of her Græco-Egyptian associate Serapis, the patron deity of Alexandria, who has a considerable following in Rome, acclaiming him as “lord of all the elements, dispenser of all good and master of human life.” Unfortunately, however, along with these deities there goes a whole swarm of lesser Oriental divinities who do nothing but provide fine chances for the scoffers and the charlatans.

The priests of the dog-headed Nile-god Anubis are denounced by Juvenal as a “linen-clad and cheating crew,” who levy on silly women, and who will declare any infamy to be morally “pardoned” for the bribe of a fat goose or some thick slices of cake. Korybus, Sabazius, the bull Apis, and the Syrian Baal cannot pretend to be better. Many a decent Roman beholding their worship will reëcho Plutarch’s recent words, “Better not to believe in a god at all, than to cringe before a god who is worse than the worst of men.” Nevertheless there is one Oriental cult now penetrating Rome which seems to lay stress on moral purity and on noble living—the religion of Mithras.

378. The Cult of Mithras: Its Relative Nobility.—Mithras is by origin the Sun God of the Zoroastrian Persians.[241] He is the “fiend smiter”; the beneficent light which disperses mental as well as material darkness. Sol Invictus—“The All-Conquering Sun”—his votaries call him, but in statues and pictures he is commonly represented as a handsome youth, wearing the Phrygian cap and mantle, and kneeling upon a bull which has been thrown upon the ground, and whose throat the god is cutting. In the Mithras pictures there often appear also the mysterious figures of a dog, a serpent, and a scorpion, all somehow connected with the ritual of the god.

This cultus first passed from the East to the hardy pirates of Cilicia, whom Pompey the Great subdued in the last years of the old Republic. Then gradually the Western world began to learn about the Mithras “chapels,” about the seven grades of initiates, about solemn purifications from sin, and about an esoteric teaching which laid great stress on personal righteousness, condemned vicious pretenses and claimed to reconcile man with god in a manner promising the former a joyous and noble hereafter.

The Mithras cult is now making its way very rapidly, especially in the imperial army. All up and down the great garrison towns and standing camps along the frontiers “Mithras chapels” are being erected, small chambers suitable for only a few dozen of initiates. The rites and teachings are very secret, and it is impossible to penetrate them as we can part of the worship of Isis.

Mithras worship furthermore makes no pretense of being a cult for the masses—it is a blessing reserved strictly for the proved and purified. All we know about it, however, convinces us that its ethics are noble, that it repudiates all coarse sensuality, and that it leaves its votaries genuinely better men and women, summoning them to be coadjutors of the “Unconquerable Sun” in his glorious war against spiritual darkness.

As yet the Mithras worship in the West is relatively young, but the time will approach when great Emperors, Aurelian and Diocletian, will proudly number themselves among its initiates, and in Mithraism ancient paganism will make its last real proffer for the allegiance of high-minded men.[242]

379. The Taurobolium (“Bath in Bull’s Blood”).—Connected with these Oriental cults, worthy and unworthy, there has come in a ceremony utterly strange to the religion of Numa, which, nevertheless, is gaining increasing vogue,—the Taurobolium. Originally it belonged to the votaries of Cybele, but the Mithras worshipers have adopted it likewise.

The rite is supposed to give one a peculiar cleansing from sin, and being decidedly expensive appeals not a little to wealthy personages who do not mind showing how their riches can put them on better terms with heaven than is possible for the run of mortals. With increasing frequency can be seen tombstones of magnates inscribed “Reborn to Eternity through the Taurobolium,” and it is held by many that persons submitting to this ordeal are assured of a happy immortality—at least, if they should die within twenty years of the ceremony; after which it can be repeated.

Old line Romans ordinarily have not as yet felt a great need for the Taurobolium,[243] but one of Calvus’s acquaintances, the senator Faventinus, has followed his initiation into Mithraism by celebrating the rite. It is indeed something which only deep religious convictions can induce persons of sensitive and luxurious tastes to undergo, although the special priests who conduct the proceeding know how to render it an impressive ceremony.

Faventinus appeared at the appointed place before a concourse of Mithraic initiates, wearing a golden crown and with his toga tightly girded about him; then he descended into a deep pit over which was placed a platform of stout boards. With mystical words and songs a consecrated bull was led upon the platform and there directly slaughtered in a manner causing its blood to flow freely through the chinks in the timbers upon the worshiper below. As the blood descended Faventinus extended his arms and uplifted his face that as much might cover him as possible.

When the initiate was taken out—his whole person and garments blood-soaked—other mysterious liturgies were recited over him. He was now a “Father” in the Mithraic order—of the highest class of initiates, purged of all human dross, and entitled to close communion with the deity. After all, the price of a fine bull and round fees to the priests seem little enough to pay for such an exalted privilege.

380. The Christians: Pagan Account of Their Origin.—There is still another cult in Rome, although cultivated men and women no less than the run of plebeians speak of it with utter aversion. Since the reign of Claudius there has existed a sect of degraded creatures, at first Jews[244] and Levantines, but later comprising also Greeks and Italians, known as Christians.

Excluding the vulgar tattle of the mob, as good an authority as Tacitus writes thus: “Christus from whom the name of the sect is derived was put to death in the reign of Tiberius, by the procurator Pontius Pilatus. The deadly superstition having been checked for a while, began to break out again not only throughout Judea, where this mischief first arose but also at Rome, where from all sides all things scandalous and shameful meet and become fashionable.”[245]

By Nero’s time the Christians were in such disfavor with the populace, being “misanthropes” and “enemies of the human race,” as well as blasphemers of the gods, that the evil Emperor tried to make them scapegoats for the burning of Rome—although the pretense was too thin. People said the Christians were wicked enough, but that they were not guilty at least of that!

381. The Persecution of Christians: Their “Insane Obstinacy.”—Nowhere, in those respectable quarters in which our visit has moved, can we get any detailed information as to what these Christians really do and believe. Very few important persons have so far adhered to them, although there is a story that Flavius Clemens, a consul and a kinsman of Domitian (who put him to death along with so many other nobles), was actually caught by their supposedly crazy doctrines.

The sect has been declared unlawful ever since Nero’s day, and from time to time its members have been arrested and their conventicles (usually held in half-concealed burial places or in sand pits in the suburbs) have been broken up. The magistrates, however, are slack; the vigiles are busy chasing down ordinary thieves and murderers; and the Christians most of the time are left alone. Hadrian, in fact, with his general tolerance, is said somewhat to have discouraged active persecution. The Christians, nevertheless, are still under the ban of the law; and being mostly slaves, freedmen, and resident foreigners, get very short shrift if actually brought before the Præfect.

It is extremely easy to convict them: there is no need of elaborate testimony, you merely summon the defendants to burn incense to the image of the Genius of the Emperor and to curse the name of Christus. No Christian will ever do this. The trials therefore are usually very brief, and soon after they occur the crowd at the Flavian is ordinarily gratified by the sight of one of the Christians’ “overseers” (bishops) or “assistants” (deacons) instead of an ordinary bandit, awaiting the spring of the lion.

These sectaries are said to be very bold, professing not to fear death which will only give them a surer and a better immortality than that secured by the Taurobolium. Beyond a doubt (any cultivated man will tell us) such defiant persons ought to be executed, if merely for their “insane obstinacy,” although the edicts are only enforced spasmodically and the Christians are often allowed several years of peace.[246]

382. Current Charges against the Christians.—If popular gossip, however, means anything, these people should deserve the worst possible fate. At their nocturnal gatherings, where men and women assemble, it is alleged, for a wild orgy, the central rite is said to consist of killing a babe and drinking its blood, while celebrants pledge themselves to commit every kind of wickedness. Finally they tie a dog to the lamp standards and incite the brute to upset the lights; then in the ensuing darkness follow deeds of violence indescribable.

It is also rumored that their Christus (who, of course, died the basest of possible deaths on the cross) actually had the head of an ass. You can see crude wall drawings deriding his votaries, as for example, one showing a youth kneeling before an ass-headed figure on a cross, with the scribbled legend, “Alexander is adoring his god.”[247]

How far are these gross charges true? Such aristocrats as Calvus merely shrug their shoulders; they are not interested. However, about 112 A.D. Pliny the Younger, while governor of Bithynia, being compelled to enforce the Anti-Christian laws, seized two Christian women known as “deaconesses” and put them to torture in order to find out what really happened at their gatherings. He reported that he had discovered that nothing criminal went on but only “a perverse and excessive superstition.” Probably, senatorial circles will assure us, there is not much to be dreaded from such a movement which cannot possibly appeal to educated men well grounded in philosophy. Of course, Mithraism is very much more respectable, and according to all fashionable judgment has a far greater future before it!