ly called "Orphic"[2022]) which,
while it gave prominence to spiritual ideas and moral ideals, introduced
a lively emotional element into worship. In the Eleusinian and other
mysteries this element was both external (dramatic representations,
songs, processions, ceremonies of initiation) and internal (the hope of
salvation). Without breaking with the popular religious forms the
mysteries constructed their own forms, chose their members, and created
a religious _imperium in imperio_. They were voluntary associations for
worship, ignored distinctions of social rank, had great ideas and
impressive rituals--apparently all the elements necessary to the
establishment of churches or of a national church. Yet they faded
gradually away, and perished finally without leaving any definite
impression, as it seemed, on Greece or the world without.[2023]

+1098+. The reasons of their failure are not far to seek. They did not
reach the Hellenic mind for the reason that they were of foreign origin
and much in them was opposed to the genius of the Hellenic religion.
Even the Pythagorean reform movement of Southern Italy, with its
strenuous moral culture of the individual, seems to have had a foreign
(Asiatic) coloring. It was, indeed, at one with the better Greek thought
of the time (sixth century B.C. and later) in its elevated conception of
the deity and of worship, but with this it combined ascetic observances
and, apparently, mystical ideas; it established what may be called a
church, which had a great vogue in Southern Italy for several centuries
but did not, as an organization, penetrate into Greece. It attracted
some thoughtful men, but was too calm and restrained for the
masses.[2024]

+1099+. It was different with the Dionysiac cult, whose wildness made
it popular; of foreign origin, it was in time partly Hellenized and in
Athens took its place in the regular national worship; some of its
foreign features were taken up in the mysteries. These latter, with
their enthusiasm and their half-barbaric ceremonies, excited the
contempt of most of the educated class.[2025] These cults were
Asiatic--not Semitic--but probably a product of a non-Hellenic
population of Asia Minor (Phrygia and other regions), developed during a
period the history of which is obscure.

+1100+. The Semites seem to have produced no mysteries--there is no
record of such cults in Babylonia, Syria, Phoenicia, the Hebrew
territory, or Arabia; Semitic religion was