That, howsoe'er I stray and range,
Whate'er I do, Thou dost not change.
I steadier step when I recall
That, if I slip, Thou dost not fall."

Here is one "counsel of perfection," and a nobler one, as we hold it, than the 66 counsel" which Mr. Pater has embodied as a main drift or moral in the story of Marius. But with this protest our fault-finding comes to an end.

There are many other minor points in the book which would repay discussion. Has it done justice to the complexities either of the Roman world or of Christianity in the second century? In fairness to Marcus Aurelius and the pagan world, ought there not to have been some hint of that aspect of the Christian question which leads Renan to apply to the position of the Christian in a pagan city the analogy of that of "a Protestant missionary in a Spanish town where Catholicism is very strong, preaching against the saints, the Virgin, and processions?" Would it not have been well, as an accompaniment to the exquisite picture of primitive Christian life, to have given us some glimpse into the strange excitements and agitations of Christian thought in the second century? As far as Marius is concerned, the different currents of Christian speculation at the time might hardly have existed. Then, again, is there not a little humor wanting, which, according to the facts, ought to have been there, in such a description as that lovely one, of the temple and rites of Esculapius? But these questions we can only throw out for the reader of Marius to ponder if he will. However they may be answered, the value and delightfulness of the book remain. It is so full of exquisite work, of thought fresh from heart and brain, that when the reader has made all his reservations, and steadily refused his adhesion to this or that appeal which it contains, he will come back with fresh delight to the passages and descriptions and reveries in which a poetical and meditative nature has poured out a wealth of imaginative reflection. Two pieces especially he will lay by in the store-house of memory-the "pagan

death" of Flavian, the half-Christian death of Marius. Let us give a last satisfaction to the feelings of admiration stirred in us by a remarkable book by quoting the beautiful concluding paragraph which describes how the sensitive soul of Marius passes from the world it had sought so early to understand and enjoy :

sleepless nights of those forced marches, he

"Then, as before, in the wretched,

46

would try to fix his mind-as it were impassively, and like a child thinking over the toys it loves, one after the other, that it may fall asleep so, and forget all about them the sooner -on all the persons he had loved in life-on his love for them, dead or living, grateful for his love or not, rather than on theirs for him letting their images pass away again, or rest with him, as they would. In the bare sense of having loved, he seemed to find, even amid this foundering of the ship, that on which his soul might assuredly rest and depend.". It was after a space of deep sleep that he awoke amid the murmuring voices of the people who had kept and tended him so carefully through his sickness, now kneeling around his bed; and what he heard confirmed, in his then perfect clearness of soul, the spontaneous suggestion of his own bodily feeling. He had often dreamt that he had been condemned to die, that the hour, with wild thoughts of es

cape, had arrived; and awaking, with the sun all around him, in complete liberty of life, had been full of gratitude for his place there, alive still, in the land of the living. He read surely, now, in the manner, the doings of these peo

ple, some of whom were passing away through the doorway, where the sun still lay heavy and full, that his last morning was come, and turn to think again of the beloved. Of old, he had often fancied that not to die on a dark and rainy day would itself have a little alleviating grace or favor about it. The people around his bed were praying fervently: Abi! Abi! anima Christiana! In the moments of his extreme helplesness the mystic bread had been placed, had descended like a snow-flake from the sky, between his lips. Soothing fingers had applied to hands and feet, to all those old passage-ways of the senses through which the world had come and gone from him, now so dark and obstructed, a medicinable oil. It evening of that day, took up his remains, and was the same people who, in the grey, austere buried them secretly with their accustomed prayers; but with joy, also, holding his death, according to their generous view of this matter, to have been in the nature of a martyrdom; and the martyrdom, as the Church had always said, is a kind of sacrament with plenary grace."

Macmillan's Magazine.

IN the year 1877 I published a short account of the reliefs usually to be met with on the tombs of the ancient Athenians, and of the inscriptions by which these reliefs were sometimes accompanied. Only seven years have since elapsed, but they have been years full of research and discovery in Greece. Through the length and breadth of the land there has been a stirring; excavations have been carried on at a score of sites, and modern Greeks have vied with the French and German archæologists who make their head-quarters at Athens in searching everywhere for the sculptured remains of antiquity, and publishing to the world the results of their discoveries. And in no class of ancient monuments have more extensive or more important discoveries been made than in the class of sepulchral monuments, so that we have now to revise in fresh light our opinions of seven years ago. In some respects we have altogether to remodel those opinions. So rapid is in our days the growth of Greek archæological science, that every year consigns to Limbo some dictum of the older school of archæologists, who laid down rules as to Greek art with all the courage of limited experience.

But the chief discoveries of sepulchral reliefs have been made outside Attica. Nothing has appeared to throw doubt on the thesis, firmly established by the discovery of the great Athenian cemetery by the gate Dipylon, that in sculpturing their tombs the minds of the Athenians exhibited a strong tendency to look backwards rather than forwards, to dwell on the life which finds its termination in the grave, rather than on that which there begins. Most people are more or less acquainted with the typical Athenian sepulchral reliefs. Every one can now study specimens of the class in the new museum of casts at South Kensington. In most cases their subject is either an individual, represented as occupied in some favorite pursuit, or a family group, parents and children, brothers and sisters, seated together or greeting one another. Gently and with

exquisite taste there is introduced into the scene some detail which gives a hint of the approach of death: the figures have an air of grieving without apparent cause; they seem to be setting out on a journey without apparent purpose; only now and then figures of Hermes, the conductor of souls, or of the ferryman Charon in the foreground, suggest what is the reality which casts so sad a shadow on charming social scenes.

One kind of reliefs not rare in Attica, but found also in other parts of Greece and Asia Minor, has caused more doubt and roused longer discussions than the rest. It is the class on which a banquet is represented; a man, or two men, reclining at a table which is covered with food and wine, their wives seated at their feet in Greek fashion, while slaves serve the repast. In the idea of a banquet served thus in the gate of death there is something incongruous and strange, something which provokes theory and discussion. Two schools of archæologists have explained the scene in two very different ways, the one school maintaining that the banquet represented belongs to ordinary everyday life, and to the past history of the person whose tomb it adorns; while another school have held that in this particular case the reference is not to the past but to the future, to the life after death, and the enjoyments which belong to it. The former interpretation was advocated by Welcker and Jahn, and is supported by the analogy of the other Athenian reliefs, which do undoubtedly refer to the past rather than the future. Yet we now know beyond any doubt that the latter interpretation is the true one. We now know that the custom of referring only to the life of the past was not by any means universally observed in the subjects painted and sculptured on Greek tombs. It was the line taken by the high art of Athens and other great cities; indeed, it best suited the instincts of all Greek art, to which all that was vague and mystic was repulsive and ugly. But it did not altogether satisfy the emotions and beliefs of the common

people, especially in the more backward cities of Hellas, and among conservative races like the Dorians and Arcadians. They did not believe that human life ended at the grave, and they did not content themselves with representations which seemed to imply that such was the case. They loved to think of and represent their dead ancestors as still living. In the year 1877 Messrs. Dressel and Milchhoefer, two members of the German school of Athens, wandering through Peloponnese in the laudable fashion of German students, and eagerly looking out for works of ancient art, lighted at Sparta upon some very remarkable monuments then recently exhumed. These were certain stelæ or slabs, bearing a relief which represented two persons, a man and a woman, enthroned side by side, and depicted in a very archaic style of art. The man usually holds a wine-cup and the woman grasps the end of her veil. A snake appears close behind the pair, and sometimes there are depicted as approaching them with offerings, votaries whom their diminutive size shows to be of far less dignity than the principal figures. It was at once evident to the discoverers of these slabs that the subject depicted on them was the offering of sacrifices to a male and female deity. But, as is so often the case with new and important discoveries, the whole bearing of the reliefs was not at first seen. Two theories were at once mooted in regard to them. One set of archæologists saw in the seated male figure holding the winecup the god Dionysus, and in his consort either Ariadne, or perhaps Persephone, who was in some parts of Greece regarded as the wife of the Chthonic Dionysus. Other archæologists preferred to consider the pair as Hades and Persephone, the great deities of the unseen world, and supposed that the intention was to represent sacrifices brought to them by mortals as a propitiation, and in hopes to secure their favor in the world of shades. Messrs. Dressel and Milchhoefer accepted at first the view last mentioned, and adduced several arguments in its favor. They pointed out the prevalence of the worship of Hades and the great goddesses of nature in several parts of Peloponnesus, particularly at Andania in Messenia, and in

Arcadia, and tried to show that the character of the offerings was well fitted to the cultus of these dread powers of the future world. The wine-cup in the hand of Hades they regarded as a substitute for the cornucopia which he more commonly carries.

This view, though incorrect, was at the time very natural. But very shortly a number of monuments of a similar kind were brought to light in other parts of the Peloponnesus and of Northern Greece, which made it impossible longer to doubt of the true meaning of the Spartan stelæ.

For instance, at Sparta two slabs were discovered which had certainly served as tombstones, and bore the names of Timocles and Aristocles respectively. On each of these was represented a seated male figure, holding wine-cup and pomegranate. Here the representation was evidently of the man who was buried in the tomb. And in other cases the person thus seated is female, in some cases holding a pomegranate or feeding a serpent from a cup.

These fresh instances have suggested for the earlier-found and better-known Spartan reliefs, a new interpretation which is, I believe, universally accepted. The pair seated in state must be the deceased hero or ancestor and his wife. They await the offerings of their descendants and votaries, who bring them such objects as were in Greece commonly offered to the dead-fowls, and eggs, and pomegranates. The snake who accompanies them is the well-known companion and servant of the dead.

We find, then, in Peloponnesus and in other parts of Greece, in quite early times, abundant monuments testifying to the prevalence of a widely-spread cultus of the dead. We have proof that not only did the gods, and those heroes of old who had almost stepped into the rank of the gods, receive worship and sacrifice in the temples and houses of the Greeks, but also ordinary human beings after their death. In text-books which deal with Greek antiquities we had already read of these customs, but they had hitherto been supposed to have left little trace in literature and in art. Men well acquainted with Greek history and customs had often scarcely heard of them or given them a thought.

But now the evidences of the customs of vervola in Greece need no longer be sought in writers of Alexandrian times and in inscriptions. They are thrust under the eyes of all who gain but a superficial acquaintance with Greek art. It is not too much to say that the new discoveries are to archæologists quite a revelation, and of the greatest value to those who care to study the origin and the history of religious belief.

We will briefly set forth the Greek beliefs on the subject of the life after death, and secondly, give a general view of the Greek sepulchral monuments which illustrate those beliefs, ending with the Attic sepulchral banquets from which we took our start.

An idea which commonly prevails among barbarous peoples as to the life after death is, that it is in essentials merely a continuation of the ordinary mundane existence. When alive the warrior requires a house, when dead he must be sheltered in a tomb; and the form and arrangements of early tombs often follow those of the house. When alive the warrior requires food; when he is dead food must still be brought to him in his new abode. He must have drink also, and pleasant smells, lamps to light his darkness, and abundant vesture and armor for him to wear. As hunting was the principal pleasure in life, so in the life after death the warrior must have all things necessary for the chase. His horse and his dog must be slain and buried with him, that they may continue their services to their master. His wife must also attend his steps to the new state of existence; and enemies must be slain at the spot where he is buried, in order that he may have slaves to do his behests in the future as in the past.

This general statement is fully borne out by the testimony afforded by the graves of ancient peoples. The walls of Egyptian tombs are painted with innumerable scenes of public and religious and private life-scenes like those amid which the dead man had passed his days.

To the real scenes the paintings bore a similar resemblance to that which the shadowy life of the tomb bore to the real life of the flesh. The interior of Etruscan tombs is adorned with scenes of revelry, of amusement, and sport, to glad the eyes of the hero hover

ing within and disperse his ennui; and in these tombs are found the bones of the warrior's horse and dog, who were slain to bear him company on the last journey. In early Greek graves are found armor and vestments, cups and vases, weapons and utensils. The writer will not easily lose the sense that the Greeks of early times really believed in this existence of the tomb which flashed upon him when, in turning over the spoils found by Dr. Schliemann in the tombs at Mycenæ, he came upon a whetstone, actually put among the swords that their edge might be renewed when blunted with use.

In the later times of the Egyptians and the Greeks this naïve faith died away, and was replaced by beliefs of a more worthy and spiritual kind. Men came to believe in a realm of souls far away beyond the desert or hidden in the depths of the earth, and presided over by mighty and just rulers. They began to feel that it was the soul only that survived death, and that it did not stay at the tomb, but went on a long journey, and abode far from descendant and townsman. But we find always in history that customs outlast the beliefs which gave birth to them, and often survive into quite a different state of opinion. So it was in this case. The burial customs which arose when the grave was supposed to be a real abode were kept up when the soul was believed entirely to quit the body at death. was still in the tomb that provision for the future life was heaped up. It was in the actual mouth of the corpse that the fee for Charon, the ferryman, was placed. It was to the very place of burial that offerings were brought on the all souls' days of antiquity. The logical complement of the later doctrine of Hades would have been to regard as immaterial what happened to the body after death. But this was a point never reached by ancient nations; they always regarded want of burial of the body as fatal to the bliss of the soul in Hades.

It

Changes did, however, take place in burial customs in consequence of the growing discordance between them and popular belief. They were still maintained, but in more and more perfunctory and unreal fashion. The arms and ornaments buried with the dead became

flimsier and less fit for use. Every archæologist knows that sometimes the graves of Greece and Etruria contain the mere pretence of offerings: gold ornaments as thin as paper; loaves and fruits of terra-cotta; weapons unfit for use, and vases of the most unserviceable kind. "In sacris simulata pro veris accipi," wrote Servius; and in no class of sacred rites does hollow pretence more commonly take the place of reality than in those connected with funerals and tombs.

Such, in merest outline, is the history of Greek beliefs as to the life beyond the grave during the course of the historical ages. And if we examine a few examples of the various groups of sepulchral monuments to be found in that country, we shall find ample illustration of our sketch.

Among the earliest of Greek sculpt ured tombstones are those Spartan reliefs of which mention has already been made. In them we see the departed ancestor and ancestress seated like gods to receive the homage of survivors. When the seated hero holds out a winecup, it seems a broad hint to survivors to fill it. Accordingly, in Boeotian and other reliefs, we actually see a female figure approaching to fill from a pitcher the extended vessel. And upon Greek graves they commonly lay, as we learn from the testimony of excavations, an amphora of coarse ware to receive the doles of wine brought to the cemetery. The food brought by suppliants on the Peloponnesian stela consist of eggs and fowls, and more especially the pomegranate. This last seems to have been the recognised food of the shades. Hades gives it to his stolen bride, Persephone; and she, by eating it, becomes incapable of quitting the place of the dead to return to her bright existence in the upper air. And to this day pomegranate seeds are one element in the sweet cakes which are made to be distributed by those who have lost a friend, at certain intervals after his deathcakes evidently representing those bestowed in old times on the lost friend himself.

This realism of offerings to the dead naturally suggests to us that the idea of offerings of food and wine to the deities themselves arose from the transfer to

them of ideas originally connected with dead mortals. In historical times the Greeks made wide distinction between the offerings to deities and those brought to heroes, both as to time and mode of sacrifice, and as to the objects; but this distinction is not fundamental, and we cannot help looking on the whole custom of sacrifice as one imported into the cultus of deities from that of the dead. It is not unusual to represent deities also in sculpture as holding out a cup or vessel, and it seems clear that whatever meaning the Greeks attached to the action in later times, it must in earlier have signified a readiness to receive offerings. Great sculptors substituted for this action, which to them seemed trivial or mean, some higher motive, placing a Victory or a sceptre in the hands of the greater divinities; but in case of some of the lesser, such as Túxn, Fortune, the patera remained to the end a not unusual attribute.

The snake which is erect behind the pair stands in a very intimate relation to the dead. His habit of dwelling in holes in those rocky spots which the Greeks chose for their cemeteries, amid which he mysteriously appeared and disappeared, originated the idea that he was either the companion or even the impersonation of the dead ("incertus geniumne loci famulumne parentis esse putet'); and the idea was fostered by the manners of the reptile--his shyness when approached, and the wisdom and subtilty attributed to him by the ancients. It is curious to find, in other reliefs, the horse and the dog in place of the snake. Their presence, indeed, is not in itself surprising. They have their place beside their master in the sculpture by the same right by which their bones were laid beside his in the grave. As they died with him and are his companions in the fields of Elysium, so they swell his state when he sits to receive homage and offerings. Yet it is somewhat strange to find horse and dog, which imply a free and open life of hunting and amusement, alternately with the sad and cold serpent, which belongs to no happy hunting-ground, but to the rocky soil of the cemetery.

Such being the symbolism of Spartan tombs, we naturally inquire with what purpose these designs were sculptured.