others, resort, anointing them copiously with oil, and
signalizing their respect and devotion to them in a very practical
way. As to the lingam as representing the male organ, in some form or
other--as upright stone or pillar or obelisk or slender round tower--it
occurs all over the world, notably in Ireland, and forms such a
memorial of the adoration paid by early folk to the great emblem and
instrument of human fertility, as cannot be mistaken. The pillars set
up by Solomon in front of his temple were obviously from their
names--Jachin and Boaz (1)--meant to be emblems of this kind; and the
fact that they were crowned with pomegranates--the universally accepted
symbol of the female--confirms and clinches this interpretation. The
obelisks before the Egyptians' temples were signs of the same character.
The well-known T-shaped cross was in use in pagan lands long before
Christianity, as a representation of the male member, and also at the
same time of the 'tree' on which the god (Attis or Adonis or Krishna or
whoever it might be) was crucified; and the same symbol combined with
the oval (or yoni) formed THE Crux Ansata {Ankh} of the old Egyptian
ritual--a figure which is to-day sold in Cairo as a potent charm, and
confessedly indicates the conjunction of the two sexes in one design.
(2) MacLennan in The Fortnightly Review (Oct. 1869) quotes with approval
the words of Sanchoniathon, as saying that "men first worship plants,
next the heavenly bodies, supposed to be animals, then 'pillars'
(emblems of the Procreator), and last, the anthropomorphic gods."

(1) "He shall establish" and "In it is strength" are in the Bible
the marginal interpretations of these two words.

(2) The connection between the production of fire by means of the
fire-drill and the generation of life by sex-intercourse is a very
obvious one, and lends itself to magical ideas. J. E. Hewitt in his
Ruling Races of Prehistoric Times (1894) says (vol. i, p. 8) that
"Magha, the mother-goddess worshipped in Asia Minor, was originally the
socket-block from which fire was generated by the fire-drill." Hence we
have, he says, the Magi of Persia, and the Maghadas of Indian History,
also the word "Magic."

It is not necessary to enlarge on this subject. The facts of the
connection of sexual rites with religious services nearly everywhere in
the early world are, as I say, sufficiently patent to every inquirer.
But it IS necessary to try to understand the ratio