The Eleusinian and Bacchic Mysteries

The “mystical drama” upon which the Eleusinia is founded will be found in any Classical Dictionary, as well as in these pages. It is only relevant here to give some idea of its meaning. That it was regarded as profound is evident from the peculiar rites and the obligations imposed on every initiated person. It was a reproach not to observe them. Socrates was accused of atheism, or disrespect to the gods, for never having been initiated. Ancient Symbol-Worship, p. 12, note: “Socrates was not initiated, yet after drinking the hemlock, he addressed Crito: ‘We owe a cock to Æsculapius.’ This was the peculiar offering made by initiates (now called kerknophori) on the eve of the last day, and he thus symbolically asserted that he was about to receive the great apocalypse.” See also: Progress of Religious Ideas by Lydia Maria Child, vol. ii, p. 308, and Discourses on the Worship of Priapus by Richard Payne Knight. Any person accidentally guilty of homicide or any crime, or convicted of witchcraft, was excluded. The secret doctrines are supposed to be the same as those expressed in the celebrated Hymn of Cleanthes. The philosopher Isocrates bears testimony: “She [Demeter] gave us two gifts that are most excellent: fruits, that we may not live like beasts; and that initiation, for those who take part in it have sweeter hope, both regarding the close of life and for all eternity.” In like manner, Pindar declares: “Happy is he who has beheld them and descends into the Underworld; he knows the end, he knows the origin of life.”

The Bacchic Orgies were said to have been instituted,