In the abstract of the Cosmogony of Sanchoniathon, translated into Greek by Philo Byblius, and preserved by Eusebius, these words appear;--Ἐπενόησε Θεὸς Οὐρανὸς, Βαιτύλια, λίθους ἐμψύχους μηχανησάμενος. “Ouranos contrived Batylia, stones with life.” This has been taken to be a metaphorical representation of creative power; but the _thing_ made or contained is mentioned, a thing well known by its name; and being so named, it is then _described_ as being stones with life. Besides the words of Homer, describing the Phæacian ships, I know of no other passage in writings of antiquity, in which inanimate bodies are so spoken of. The λίθους ἐμψύχους of Sanchoniathon, and the νοήματα καὶ φρένας ἀνδρῶν of Homer, apply to the same thing, the one being descriptive of the instrument, the other of its effects. These Batylia are often mentioned, not on board ship, but in temples; they are described by travellers down as late as the fourth century of our era. They were many in number in the same temple. They were not in all temples; I find no mention of them in any Greek temple, or consequently in Greece or Asia Minor; the stones endowed with life, might be supposed to mean statues, but these were not images nor things that could be classed in any known category of objects of worship or ornament. The Greek writers do not know what to make of them: they looked upon them not as a mystery, but as a piece of necromancy: a thousand wonderful things were narrated of them, amongst which were the upturning of walls, and the capturing of cities; they were said to move in the air, and to have little demons inside.[182] We are not, however, destitute of description of their figure. They were in size and shape like cricket balls, of a dark indistinct colour, πόρφυροτίδης, or black; of the substance nothing is said. The name Batylia is spoken of as Greek, and is given as the translation of another term used by the Phœnicians. The Greeks, however, could find no more a meaning for the word than for the thing; but as Greeks always have recourse to a fable when they are in want of an etymology, they gave us the following. When Rhea gave a stone instead of Jupiter to Saturn, to cover the deceit she wrapped it in a skin: the skin was Βαίτη, hence Batylia, but unluckily, _the very_ stone swallowed for Jupiter, and which, at his son’s request, Saturn afterwards vomited, was itself preserved at the temple of Delphi.[183] This is all that Greek ingenuity can effect in the way of explanation. In this shape this “indigesta moles” descends to the learned hands of modern critics.