Note 805 — Chapter VIII · THE SACRIFICE

This was really the purpose of all mysteries. They create symbolisms of death and rebirth for the practical application and education of the infantile libido. As Frazer (“The Golden Bough,” I, p. 442) points out, exotic and barbaric peoples have in their initiatory mysteries the same symbolism of death and resurrection, just as Apuleius (“Metam.,” XI, 23) says of the initiation of Lucius into the Isis mysteries: “Accessi confinium mortis et calcato Proserpinae limine per omnia vectus elementa remeavi” (I have reached the confines of death and trodden the threshold of Proserpina; passing through all the elements, I have returned). Lucius died figuratively (ad instar voluntariae mortis) and was born anew (renatus).