I cannot dwell here on the various aspects of this problem. The Hellenic statistics and their significance I have partly collected and estimated in a paper published some years ago.[25.2] The application of the sacramental idea to the explanation of the Eleusinian mysteries, ingeniously attempted by Dr. Jevons, I have discussed in the third volume of my _Cults of the Greek States_; and the Dionysiac communion-service is considered at length in the fifth. The attractiveness of the mystic appeal of the {26} Sacrament appears to have increased in the later days of paganism, especially in its period of struggle with Christianity. That strangest rite of the expiring polytheism, the ταυροβόλιον, or the baptism in bull’s blood, in the worship of Kybele, has been successfully traced back by M. Cumont to the worship of the Babylonian Anaitis. The sacramental concept was the stronghold of Mithraism, but can hardly be regarded as part of its heritage from Persia, for it does not seem to have been familiar to the Iranian religion nor to the Vedic Indian. In fact, the religious history of no other Aryan race discloses it with clearness, save that of the Thraco-Phrygian and Hellenic. Was it, then, a special product of ancient “Mediterranean” religious thought? It would be important to know, and Crete may one day be able to tell us, whether King Minos took the sacrament. Meantime, I would urge upon those who are studying this phenomenon in the various religions the necessity of precise definition, so as to distinguish the different grades of the sacramental concept, for loose statements are somewhat rife about it. Apart from the ritual of the altar, there is another mode of attaining mystic union with the divinity--namely, by means of a sacred marriage or simulated corporeal union. This is suggested by the initiation formulæ of the mysteries of Attis-Kybele. The cult of Kybele was connected with that of the Minoan goddess, and the strange legend of Pasiphae and the bull-god lends itself naturally to this interpretation. The Hellenic religion also presents us with a few examples of the holy marriage of the human bride with the god, the most notable being the annual ceremony of the union of the “Queen,” the wife of the King Archon, at Athens, with Dionysos. And in the mysteries of {27} later paganism, as well as in certain forms and symbolism of early Christianity, Professor Dieterich has traced the surviving influence of this rite.