The very fact that it was not lawful to divulge the Mystery has prevented the many writers who knew it from giving us any description by which we might gain a clear idea of this wonderful rite. We have hints of various sacred vessels, of various priests known by special technical names; of dramatic representations of the rape of Cora, and of the grief of her mother; of her complaints before Zeus, and the final reconciliation. We hear of scenes of darkness and fear, in which the hopeless state of the unbelievers was portrayed; of light and glory, to which the convert attained, when at last his eyes were opened to the knowledge of good and evil. But all these things are fragmentary glimpses, as are also the doctrines hinted of the Unity of God, and of atonement by sacrifice. There remains nothing clear and certain, but the unanimous verdict as to the greatness, the majesty, and the awe of the services, and as to the great spiritual knowledge and comfort which they conveyed. The consciousness of guilt was not, indeed, first taught by them, but was felt generally, and felt very keenly by the Greek mind. These Mysteries were its Gospel of reconciliation with the offended gods. CHAPTER VIII. FROM ATHENS TO THEBES—THE PASSES OF PARNES AND OF CITHÆRON, ELEUTHERÆ, PLATÆA. No ordinary student, looking at the map of Attica and Bœotia, can realize the profound and complete separation between these two countries. Except at the very northern extremity, where the fortified town of Oropus guarded an easy boundary, all the frontier consists not merely of steep mountains, but of parallel and intersecting ridges and gorges, which contain indeed a few alpine valleys, such as that of Œnoe, but which are, as a rule, wild and barren, easily defensible by a few against many, and totally unfit for the site of any considerable town, or any advanced culture. As I before stated, the traveller can pass through by Dekelea, or he can pass most directly by Phyle, the fort which Thrasybulus seized when he desired to reconquer Athens with his democratic exiles. The historians usually tell us “that he seized _and fortified_ Phyle”; a statement which the present aspect of it seems to render very doubtful indeed. It is quite impossible that the great hill-fort of the very finest Attic building, which is still remaining and admired by all, could have been “knocked up” by Thrasybulus and his exiles. The careful construction and the enormous extent of the building compel us to suppose it the work of a rich state, and of a deliberate plan of fortification. It seems very unlikely, for these reasons, that it was built after the days of Thrasybulus, or that so important a point of attack should have been left unguarded in the greater days of Athens. I am therefore convinced that the fort, being built long before, and being, in fact, one of the well-known fortified demes through