This symbol was from the earliest times venerated as a protecting power, and Jacob, on his journey to Laban, slept under its protecting influence: placed erect—sometimes as a tree, at others as a cross, and often as a phallus—and resting on a crescent, the modified form of the yoni, this symbol set forth the marriage of heaven and earth; and in the form of a serpent, representing life and healing, it was worshipped by the Egyptians and Jews. In the book of Genesis the phallic tree is introduced, where it is called the tree of knowledge of good and evil. From Plutarch we learn that the Egyptians represented Osiris with the organ of generation erect, to show his generative and prolific power, and that he was the same deity as the Bacchus of the Greek mythology and the first begotten love (Ερως πρωτογονος) of Orpheus and Hesiod. In an excellent work entitled “Discourse on the Worship of Priapus,” by Richard Payne Knight, there are a number of plates illustrating the mode in which this phallic worship was carried on by the ancients, some of which are very curious and well worth the trouble of studying carefully. One plate represents a celebrated bronze in the Vatican, with the male organs of generation placed on the head of a cock, the emblem of the rising sun, supported by the neck and shoulders of a man, the whole being emblematical of god incarnate with man, and on the base of which are inscribed the words ΣΩΤΗΡ ΚΟΣΜΟΥ, “Saviour of the world.” Another figure on the same plate represents an ornament in the British Museum, consisting of a male organ with wings and the foot of a man suspended from a chain. Another plate shows two representations of the god Pan, one with the organ erect, the symbol of power, or spring, the other with the organ in a state of tumid languor, and loaded with the productions of the earth, the symbol of the results of prolific efforts. Both these last are copies of bronzes in the museum of C. Townley. On another plate is a copy of another of Mr. Townley’s treasures, representing the incarnation of deity, in the shape of a man having sexual intercourse with a goat, the emblem of the new-born deity at the winter solstice, to which is appended the following note by Mr. Payne Knight: “At Mendes a living goat was kept as the image of the generative power, to whom the women presented themselves naked, and had the honour of being publicly enjoyed by him. Herodotus saw the act openly performed (ες επιδειξεν ανθρωπων), and calls it a prodigy (τερας). But the Egyptians had no such horror of it; for it was to them a representation of the incarnation of the deity, and the communication of his creative spirit to man. It was one of the sacraments of that ancient church, and was, without doubt, beheld with that pious awe and reverence with which devout persons always contemplate the mysteries of their faith, whatever they happen to be.” This figure represented the human male symbol as incarnate with the divine, instead of the divine