hich they had borne the
people. These brilliant pages teem with graphic descriptions of the actual
usages, social and religious, of their age, so that there is no difficulty
in reproducing with fair accuracy the salient features of the period.

The popular religion was that composite of heathenisms already sketched
in considering the previous period. The people continued to worship the
Power which all felt and owned, under the manifold forms which this Power
assumes in nature's processes. Sun and moon and stars still arrested the
awe which through them groped after God, and drew upon themselves the
worship of the imagination. The worship of Jehovah had a special honor as
the State religion, but it stood contentedly amid other forms of religion.
In the service of Jehovah local shrines developed special usages. The
"Uses" of Israel were as varied as the "Uses" of England before the
Reformation. No act of Uniformity was in operation in the realm. Idolatry
was not the exception but the rule. The most popular symbol of Jehovah was
an image of a bull. To the higher minds this bull was doubtless merely a
symbol, expressive of a striking phase of the sun's force, but to the mass
of men it was probably the actual object of their adorations. The
symbolism of the Jerusalem Temple was thoroughly idolatrous; as, for
example, the twelve oxen upholding the laver, and the horns of the altar,
symbols drawn from the prevalent bull-worship; the two columns in the
court, and the cherubs, or cloud-dragons in the most holy place; the
_chamanim_, or sun-images representing the rays of the sun in the shape of
a cone, and the chariots and horses of the sun, a very ancient symbol
familiar to us in Guido's Aurora.[43]

Nor did the allegiance to Jehovah bar private usages of an idolatrous
nature. The home of the average Israelite had its _teraphim_ and other
domestic divinities. The darker aspects of the popular religion still held
their ground against the growing light. Beneath the shadow of the Jehovah
of the Ten Words, stood, unmolested, the images fashioned by the appetites
and passions; and men and women surrendered themselves to drunken orgies
and sensual debauches, in honor of the deities of desire. As late as the
time of Jeremiah, after nearly two centuries of prophetic teaching, there
were in the sacred precincts of the temple the _asheras_, or tree-poles,
by which the priestesses of passion, as part of their religious offices,
sold thems