It was not to the generative organs that the ancients offered homage, but to the principles represented by them—to the active and procreative power of the god of nature, the prolific ram-sun, at the spring equinox, and to the passive and recipient mother-earth, the womb of nature, from which we all emanate and to which we all return. It is, however, reasonable to imagine, with the Rev. G. W. Cox, that “it is clear that such a cultus as this would carry with it a constantly-increasing danger, until the original character of the emblem should be as thoroughly disguised as the names of some of the Vedic deities when transferred to Hellenic soil.” Indeed, it is matter of history that these rites, which were held so sacred by the Egyptians, were turned to the basest and most wicked purposes in after times by the worshippers of Bacchus, Adonis, and other deities. The Bacchanalian mysteries and secret rites called _Dionysia_, or Supper of the lord Dionysos, were publicly denounced by the Roman authorities at the commencement of our era, as were also the _Adonia_, or Suppers of the lord Adonis, and the Love Feasts, _Agapæ_, or Suppers of the lord Jesus. From Gibbon we learn that the early Christians were in the habit of committing at their Love Feasts the most unnatural crimes with sisters, mothers, and others, as is also clearly testified by Justin Martyr, Athenagoras, Tertullian, and Minucius Felix; and Livy’s account of similar practices indulged in by the Bacchanalians at their _Dionysia_ leaves no doubt as to their participation in these horrors. So widely spread was this phallic worship that, within one hundred years of the present time, it was openly followed in some parts of Europe, as appears from a letter of Sir William Hamilton, K.B., British Minister at the Court of Naples, to Sir Joseph Banks, Bart., President of the Royal Society. Accompanying the letter the writer sends an amulet worn by women and children of Naples and the neighbourhood as ornaments of dress, which they imagine will be a preservative against _mal occhii_ (“evil eyes”), or enchantment. It represents a hand clenched, with the point of the thumb thrust between the index and middle finger, on one side, and a male organ erect on the other side, with a ring, or female organ, above, and a flaccid male organ and scrotum beneath, the whole in the form of a cross. The letter is so remarkable that it is worth while reproducing a considerable portion of it, as it appears in Mr. Knight’s work.