Chapter XII · THE WORSHIP OF MITHRAS (continued 2)

For these reasons, probably, Mithraism fell after a reign of little more than two centuries. Yet for good or ill, few religions have lived in vain; and some of the ideas which it made popular in Europe have hardly yet died out. The theory that the emperor, king, or chief of the State is of a different nature to other men, and is in a peculiar manner the care of the gods, was first formulated in the West during the time that Mithraism was in power and is a great deal more the creation of the Persian religion than of the Egyptian, in which he was said to be the incarnation of the Sun-God. This is fairly plain from the custom to which M. Cumont has lately drawn attention of releasing at the funeral or apotheosis of a Roman emperor a captive eagle, representing the soul of the dead ruler, the upward flight of the bird being held typical of the soul’s ascension into heaven^[984]. The connection of this practice with Mithraism is evident, since “eagle” was one of the names given to the perfect Mithraist, or he who had taken all the seven degrees of initiation, and had 275therefore earned the right to be called pater sacrorum^[985]. The Christian emperors of Rome continued probably the practice and certainly the nomenclature associated with it, and Constantine and his successors were hailed by the Mithraic epithets of “aeternus,” “invictus,” and “felix” as freely as his Pagan predecessors. From this period the notion of the “divinity that doth hedge a king” descended to comparatively modern times, and “Sacred Majesty” was an epithet of our own kings down to the reign of the last Stuart. Probably, too, it was the custom of releasing an eagle at a royal funeral which so impressed the popular imagination that the metaphor became transferred, as such things generally are sooner or later, to the lower ranks of the community, and the figure of the soul being borne aloft on wings took the place that it still occupies in popular Christian literature.

The share that Mithraism had in diffusing the practices of magic and astrology is by no means so clear. That the Mithraists, like other pagans of the early centuries, were addicted to magic is one of the most frequent accusations brought against them by Christian writers, and the word magic itself, as has been said above, is derived from those Magi from whom the Mithraists were said to have derived their doctrine. In support of this, it can certainly be said that the worshippers of Mithras by rendering a modified cult to Ahriman, whom the Christians identified with Satan, laid themselves open to the suspicion of trafficking with devils, and it is quite possible that they, like the followers of many other religions at the time, looked with favour upon the compulsion rather than the propitiation of the lower powers. Yet the strict monotheism of the faith which practically looked to Mithras for the ultimate control and regulation of all sublunary things, is certainly against this conclusion; and it should be noticed that the laws against the practices of magic and astrology, then so intertwined that it is difficult to separate them^[986], were quite as severe under emperors like Commodus and Diocletian who worshipped Mithras, as 276under those of their successors who professed the faith of Christ. The rites of Hecate, however, were, as we have seen, closely connected with those of Mithras and were generally in the hands of Mithraists. These Hecatean rites seem to have been almost entirely magical in their character, and it is the name of Hecate that was handed down as that of the patroness of sorcerers through the Middle Ages and the Renaissance^[987]. One of the priests of Mithras also goes out of his way to declare on his epitaph that he is studiosus astrologiae, and on the whole the Christian accusation was probably not without foundation.

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