gave himself out to be not merely a wizard but a god. Addressing his fellow-citizens in verse he said:
"O friends, in this great city that climbs the yellow slope
Of Agrigentum's citadel, who make good works your scope,
Who offer to the stranger a haven quiet and fair,
All hail! Among you honoured I walk with lofty air.
With garlands, blooming garlands you crown my noble brow,
A mortal man no longer, a deathless godhead now.
Where e'er I go, the people crowd round and worship pay,
And thousands follow seeking to learn the better way.
Some crave prophetic visions, some smit with anguish sore
Would fain hear words of comfort and suffer pain no more."
He asserted that he could teach his disciples how to make the wind to blow or be still, the rain to fall and the sun to shine, how to
banish sickness and old age and to raise the dead. When Demetrius Poliorcetes restored the Athenian democracy in 307 B.C., the
Athenians decreed divine honours to him and his father Antigonus, both of them being then alive, under the title of the Saviour
Gods. Altars were set up to the Saviours, and a priest appointed to attend to their worship. The people went forth to meet their deliv-
erer with hymns and dances, with garlands and incense and libations; they lined the streets and sang that he was the only true god,
for the other gods slept, or dwelt far away, or were not. In the words of a contemporary poet, which were chanted in public and sung
in private:
"Of all the gods the greatest and the dearest
To the city are come.
For Demeter and Demetrius
Together time has brought.
She comes to hold the Maiden's awful rites,
And he joyous and fair and laughing,
As befits a god.
A glorious sight, with all his friends about him,
He in their midst,
They like to stars, and he the sun.
Son of Poseidon the mighty, Aphrodite's son,
All hail!
The other gods dwell far away,
Or have no ears,
Or are not, or pay us no heed.
But thee we present see,
No god of wood or stone, but godhead true.
Therefore to thee we pray."
The ancient Germans believed that there was something holy in women, and accordingly consulted them as oracles. Their sacred women, we are told, looked on the eddying rivers and listened to the murmur or the roar of the water, and from the sight and sound foretold what would come to pass. But often the veneration of the men went further, and they worshipped women as true and living goddesses. For example, in the reign of Vespasian a certain Veleda, of the tribe of the Bructeri, was commonly held to be a deity,
and in that character reigned over her people, her sway being acknowledged far and wide. She lived in a tower on the river Lippe, a tributary of the Rhine. When the people of Cologne sent to make a treaty with her, the ambassadors were not admitted to her presence; the negotiations were conducted through a minister, who acted as the mouthpiece of her divinity and reported her oracular utterances. The example shows how easily among our rude forefathers the ideas of divinity and royalty coalesced. It is said that among the Getae down to the beginning of our era there was always a man who personified a god and was called God by the people. He dwelt on a sacred mountain and acted as adviser to the king.
According to the early Portuguese historian, Dos Santos, the Zimbas, or Muzimbas, a people of South-eastern Africa, "do not adore idols or recognize any god, but instead they venerate and honour their king, whom they regard as a divinity, and they say he is the greatest and best in the world. And the said king says of himself that he alone is god of the earth, for which reason if it rains when he does not wish it to do so, or is too hot, he shoots arrows at the sky for not obeying him." The Mashona of Southern Africa
55
informed their bishop that they had once had a god, but that the Matabeles had driven him away. "This last was in reference to a
curious custom in some villages of keeping a man they called their god. He seemed to be consulted by the people and had presents
given to him. There was one at a village belonging to a chief Magondi, in the old days. We were asked not to fire off any guns near
the village, or we should frighten him away." This Mashona god was formerly bound to render an annual tribute to the king of the
Matabele in the shape of four black oxen and one dance. A missionary has seen and described the deity discharging the latter part of
his duty in front of the royal hut. For three mortal hours, without a break, to the banging of a tambourine, the click of castanettes,
and the drone of a monotonous song, the swarthy god engaged in a frenzied dance, crouching on his hams like a tailor, sweating like
a pig, and bounding about with an agility which testified to the strength and elasticity of his divine legs.
The Baganda of Central Africa believed in a god of Lake Nyanza, who sometimes took up his abode in a man or woman. The incarnate god was much feared by all the people, including the king and the chiefs. When the mystery of incarnation had taken place, the man, or rather the god, removed about a mile and a half from the margin of the lake, and there awaited the appearance of the new
moon before he engaged in his sacred duties. From the moment that the crescent moon appeared faintly in the sky, the king and all
his subjects were at the command of the divine man, or Lubare (god), as he was called, who reigned supreme not only in matters of
faith and ritual, but also in questions of war and state policy. He was consulted as an oracle; by his word he could inflict or heal sick-
ness, withhold rain, and cause famine. Large presents were made him when his advice was sought. The chief of Urua, a large region
to the west of Lake Tanganyika, "arrogates to himself divine honours and power and pretends to abstain from food for days without
feeling its necessity; and, indeed, declares that as a god he is altogether above requiring food and only eats, drinks, and smokes for
the pleasure it affords him." Among the Gallas, when a woman grows tired of the cares of housekeeping, she begins to talk incoher-
ently and to demean herself extravagantly. This is a sign of the descent of the holy spirit Callo upon her. Immediately her husband
prostrates himself and adores her; she ceases to bear the humble title of wife and is called "Lord"; domestic duties have no further
claim on her, and her will is a divine law.
The king of Loango is honoured by his people "as though he were a god; and he is called Sambee and Pango, which mean god. They believe that he can let them have rain when he likes; and once a year, in December, which is the time they want rain, the people come to beg of him to grant it to them." On this occasion the king, standing on his throne, shoots an arrow into the air, which is supposed to bring on rain. Much the same is said of the king of Mombasa. Down to a few years ago, when his spiritual reign on earth was brought to an abrupt end by the carnal weapons of English marines and bluejackets, the king of Benin was the chief object of worship in his dominions. "He occupies a higher post here than the Pope does in Catholic Europe; for he is not only God's vicegerent upon earth, but a god himself, whose subjects both obey and adore him as such, although I believe their