It is here, perhaps, that the ancient worship of the Lingam comes in. The word itself is apparently connected with our word 'link,' and has originally the same meaning. (1) It is the link between the generations. Beginning with the worship of the physical Race-life, the course of psychologic evolution has been first to the worship of the Tribe (or of the Totem which represents the tribe); then to the worship of the human-formed God of the tribe--the God who dies and rises again eternally, as the tribe passes on eternal--though its members perpetually perish; then to the conception of an undying Savior, and the realization and distinct experience of some kind of Super-consciousness which does certainly reside, more or less hidden, in the deeps of the mind, and has been waiting through the ages for its disclosure and recognition. Then again to the recognition that in the sacrifices, the Slayer and the Slain are one--the strange and profoundly mystic perception that the God and the Victim are in essence the same--the dedication of 'Himself to Himself' (2) and simultaneously with this the interpretation of the Eucharist as meaning, even for the individual, the participation in Eternal Life--the continuing life of the Tribe, or ultimately of Humanity. (3) The Tribal order rises to Humanity; love ascends from the lingam to yogam, from physical union alone to the union with the Whole--which of course includes physical and all other kinds of union. No wonder that the good St. Paul, witnessing that extraordinary whirlpool of beliefs and practices, new and old, there in the first century A.D.--the unabashed adoration of sex side by side with the transcendental devotions of the Vedic sages and the Gnostics--became somewhat confused himself and even a little violent, scolding his disciples (I Cor. x. 21) for their undiscriminating acceptance, as it seemed to him, of things utterly alien and antagonistic. "Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's table and the table of devils." (1) See Sanskrit Dictionary. (2) See Ch. VIII. (3) There are many indications in literature--in prophetic or poetic form--of this awareness and distinct conviction of an eternal life, reached through love and an inner sense of union with others and with humanity at large; indications which bear the mark of absolute genuineness and sincerity of feeling. See, for instance, Whitman's poem, "To the Garden the World" (Leaves of Grass, complete edition, p. 79). But an eternal life of the third order; not, thank heaven! an eternity of the meddling and muddling self-conscious Intellect!