The sacred objects exhibited formed an essential part of the ceremony, together with the chest in which such of them as were movable were brought out—τελετῆς ἐγκύμονα μυστίδα κίστην (Nonnus, ix, 127). Æschines, in assisting the religious lustrations performed by his mother, was bearer of the chest—κιστόφορος καὶ λικνόφορος (Demosthen. de Coronâ, c. 79, p. 313). Clemens Alexandrius (Cohort. ad Gent. p. 14) describes the objects which were contained in these mystic chests of the Eleusinian mysteries,—cakes of particular shape, pomegranates, salt, ferules, ivy, etc. The communicant was permitted, as a part of the ceremony, to take these out of the chest and put them into a basket, afterwards putting them back again: “Jejunavi et ebibi cyceonem: ex cistâ sumpsi et in calathum misi: accepi rursus, in cistulam transtuli,” (Arnobius ad Gent. v, 175, ed. Elmenherst,) while the uninitiated were excluded from seeing it, and forbidden from looking at it “even from the house-top.” Τὸν κάλαθον κατιόντα χαμαὶ θασεῖσθε βέβαλοι Μήδ’ ἀπὸ τῶ τέγεος. (Kallimachus, Hymn. in Cererem, 4.) Lobeck, in his learned and excellent treatise, Aglaophamus (i, p. 51), says: “Sacrorum nomine tam Græci, quam Romani, præcipuè signa et imagines Deorum, omnemque sacram supellectilem dignari solent. Quæ res animum illuc potius inclinat, ut putem Hierophantas ejusmodi ἱερὰ in conspectum hominum protulisse, sive deorum simulacra, sive vasa sacra et instrumenta aliave priscæ religionis monumenta; qualia in sacrario Eleusinio asservata fuisse, etsi nullo testimonio affirmare possumus, tamen probabilitatis speciem habet testimonio similem. Namque non solum in templis ferè omnibus cimelia venerandæ antiquitatis condita erant, sed in mysteriis ipsis talium rerum mentio occurrit, quas initiati summâ cum veneratione aspicerent, non initiatis ne aspicere quidem liceret.... Ex his testimoniis efficitur (p. 61) sacra quæ Hierophanta ostendit, illa ipsa fuisse ἄγια φάσματα sive simulacra Deorum, eorumque aspectum qui præbeant δεῖξαι τὰ ἱερὰ vel παρέχειν vel φαίνειν dici, et ab hoc quasi primario Hierophantæ actu tum Eleusiniorum sacerdotum principem nomen accepisse, tum totum negotium esse nuncupatum.” Compare also K. F. Hermann, Gottesdienstliche Alterthümer der Griechen, part ii, ch. ii, sect. 32. A passage in Cicero de Haruspicum Responsis (c. 11), which is transcribed almost entirely by Arnobius adv. Gentes, iv, p. 148, demonstrates the minute precision required at Rome in the performance of the festival of the Megalesia: the smallest omission or alteration was supposed to render the festival unsatisfactory to the gods. The memorable history of the Holy Tunic at Treves, in 1845, shows what immense and wide-spread effect upon the human mind may be produced, even in the nineteenth century, by ἱερὰ δεικνύμενα.