Note 157 — Chapter V · DIONYSUS THE MYTHICAL GOD

Wine only became the symbol of all these elixirs because it happened to be the most potent drink. See Mr. Robert Brown’s remarks on this, op. cit., vol. ii., p. 104: “But the Theoinos, or god of a mystic drink of immortality, is an almost world-wide concept; and wine signifies not merely grape-wine, but barley wine the juice of the Haoma or Soma plant, or any other intoxicating or exciting drink which by an artificial stimulus carries man for a time beyond himself, and so seemed a type of immortality or conscious strength delivered from weakness and languor.”